Inimica, Amator
by QueenOfTheDreamers87
Summary: Hermione falls asleep in January 2000. She awakens in a Knockturn Alley flat in 1947. Confronted by the reality that she's been hurtled through time and space to the world of Tom Riddle himself, Hermione works to get back home. In the meantime, desperate for money, she takes a job at the only place willing to hire her - Borgin and Burkes, with the disarmingly charming Tom Riddle.
1. Chapter 1

_1 January 2000_

Hermione shoved open the door of her flat and muttered,

"I am going to keep my own name, Ronald. That's the end of it."

"Right. We don't have to discuss this anymore. It's not worth a fight." Ron Weasley sighed and touched his fingertips to his head. "I'm so drunk right now."

"Well," Hermione murmured, "It is the New Year. And it is a new Millennium. Loads to celebrate."

"And we are getting married," Ron reminded her. He stumbled over the doorjamb into her flat and cupped her jaw as he kicked her door shut. "Loads to celebrate."

Hermione put her hands on his jacket and let him bend down to kiss her, tasting firewhisky on him and then hissing,

"It's so late. I've got work to do in the morning."

"Of course you have," Ron said, almost angrily. "New year, though, innit?"

"Ronald. You're positively washed out. Let's get you to the bed," Hermione said. She started to lead him toward her bedroom, and she said, "Good thing I brought you here by Side-Along; you'd have Splinched off an arm. I think Ginny took Harry home, too. You boys."

"Yeah, well, thanks for the help." Ron sank onto the side of Hermione's bed and began peeling off his party attire. He shucked his dark outer robe and then unbuttoned the cream-coloured shirt beneath. Hermione stared at him for a moment, wondering distantly whether or not she actually found him attractive. They'd been friends for so very long. It had been an odd transition to view Ron Weasley as a sexual creature.

She was mildly self-conscious as she took off her ruby-red party dress, casting Scouring charms upon herself until her makeup was gone and her hair was clean. She faced away from Ron as she unhooked her bra and wriggled out of her knickers, and then she tossed them into the hamper of clothes she would Scour in the morning. She pulled a simple nightgown of black cotton from her bureau and wrenched it over her head. By the time she turned round, Ron had already tucked himself, shirtless with mussed hair, under her blankets.

"Goodnight," Hermione said quietly as she arranged herself beside him.

"Night," he mumbled, sounding drunk and tired. "Happy New Year."

"Happy New Year." Hermione aimed her wand at the sconce on the wall and snuffed it out. She set her wand down on the bedside table and shut her eyes, and she was surprised at how quickly sleep came, bringing with it only a deep, abiding peace.

When she blinked her eyes open, Hermione fully expected to see Ron beside her, still sleeping soundly in a lazy lump of swaying, hungover mass. But as she rolled toward him, she realised she was alone in her bed. She blinked in the morning sunlight and frowned, feeling confused. Her sheets looked different; she'd had rose-patterned sheets when she'd fallen asleep, and now she was staring at an empty bed of plain white blankets and linens. Hermione sat up quickly and snatched at the bedside table, grabbing her wand out of instinct. It was there, but she quickly realised something.

She was somewhere else.

She was not in her flat.

Hermione sprang out of the strange bed and looked around the bedroom in which she'd awakened, her breath panting quickly through clenched teeth. Her bedroom had wallpaper; these walls were painted butter yellow. The window here looked out onto a rooftop instead of a street. This was nowhere near her flat; this was somewhere else.

"Ronald?" Hermione called out his name tremulously, but there was no response. She walked around the bed and aimed her wand outward, ready to face anyone who might come springing toward her out of a room or from around a corner. She approached a little bathroom and jabbed her wand inside the room, the tip of her wand quivering in the air as she examined the space. Black and white tile and a white clawfoot tub filled the small space, which Hermione knew she had never seen. She began rushing around the space in which she'd awakened then, making her way through a tiny sitting room and a little kitchen with a table.

"_Homenum_ _Revelio__!_"

Her spell, intended to reveal the presence of anyone else in the space, gave her no response. She was alone. She gulped and wondered just what the blazes had happened. Accidental Apparition? Had she somehow touched a Cursed object? Something she hadn't realised was a Portkey? Well, whatever had happened, Hermione thought, it had been a terrible mistake, or else someone had targeted her. She needed to get out of here, now.

She shut her eyes tightly and thought of her flat in London, whirling hard to her right. But instead of Apparating, she just stumbled and landed on her bottom. She scowled and staggered up to her feet. She tried again, three times, to Disapparate from where she was and to go away. When her flat didn't work again, she tried to go to Diagon Alley, then to go to Hogsmeade. Nothing worked. She couldn't Apparate.

Hermione scratched at her hair and aimed her wand down at her black nightgown. She set to work with some Conjuring and Transfiguration, crafting herself a simple cotton bra and knickers that didn't fit quite right but would have to do for now. She wasn't exactly an expert with textiles. She changed her nightgown into a humble cotton shift dress, the best she could manage in making it appear less like pyjamas and more like day clothes. She took two books off of a shelf on the wall in the sitting room and used a spell she'd learnt in Fourth-Year Transfigurations to change them to shoes, then adjusted the size until they (more or less) worked on her feet. She blackened the leather with a Charm Professor Flitwick had taught her in her second year. Then she Scoured her teeth and Neatened her hair, and she smirked and shook her head.

"Thank you, Hogwarts education," she whispered dryly. She walked quickly out of the front door of the flat, or whatever space this was, still carefully gripping her wand. She was determined to figure out just where she'd accidentally awakened. Somehow, her own ability to move through space had not only been crippled, but she'd also been transplanted from her own flat to… wherever she was now. She needed someone to help her get home. She was Hermione Granger, war hero and Ministry employee. Surely there was an easy solution to all of this.

As she walked out of the flat's front door, she found herself in a tile-floored corridor with blank white walls. This was a spartan building, she thought. It felt very old. Hermione frowned, thinking that this felt like a wizarding building. She scratched at her head again and descended the stairs, adjusting her grip on her wand as an ancient woman with pigtail white braids ascended the staircase.

"Good morning," Hermione said carefully, but the witch did not answer. Hermione cleared her throat as the woman started to pass, and she said, "Would you mind, madam, please, telling me where exactly we are right now?"

The woman did not answer. She just kept walking. Was she deaf, Hermione wondered? Her brows furrowed very deeply, and as she reached the bottom of the stairs, she pushed open the heavy wooden door that led out of the building. She was instantly hit with a blast of cold air. It had been unseasonably warm when she and Ron had left their New Year's party, she remembered. Now she was hit with a face full of snow flurries. Could the temperature really fall so quickly?

She let the door shut and took a few steps, and she instantly realised where she was. Knockturn Alley. She looked to her left and saw signage for Markus Scarrs Indelible Tattoos and The White Wyvern. Hermione stepped into the narrow street as a cold wind blew toward her, and she shivered mightily. She'd Transfigured herself a dress with elbow-length sleeves; she had no cloak or scarf or gloves. Indeed, a passing wizard with a pointy face gave her a very strange look and asked,

"Cold, aren't you, girl?"

"Erm…" Hermione tried to say more, but it occurred to her that she'd passed about ten people now, and she didn't recognise any of them. She hadn't known the old witch in the building of flats. She hadn't known anyone in the cluster of people outside Markus Scarrs. She didn't know the wizard who had just questioned her, nor the witch walking with him. Who were all of these people? Why was it that this Knockturn Alley felt so very foreign to Hermione?

She froze then, for she was passing a shopfront with a sign that read _Madam Amaranth's Herbs._ Hermione's mouth fell open, and she blinked. She had not spent much time in Knockturn Alley in her life, but she knew from reading multiple history books that Madam Amaranth's had been forced by the Ministry to close in 1972 after it was discovered that Lord Voldemort was secretly using the shop and its financial accounts for his own purposes. The closing of Madam Amaranth's at the beginning of the First Wizarding War was part of the Ministry's desperate attempts to shut down the ascent of Voldemort. It hadn't worked, of course.

But right now, Madam Amaranth's Herbs appeared to be fully functional. Through the window, Hermione could see a tall wizard with dark hair talking with a middle-aged witch behind a desk. It looked warm in there, and Hermione was shivering so badly that her teeth clacked and her body shook violently. She headed toward the shop and opened the door, walking slowly inside. The wizard at the counter turned his head, raising one eyebrow as he surveyed the young witch who was dressed completely inappropriately for the weather.

"Hello," Hermione said, and the greying witch behind the counter bowed her head in greeting. When she spoke, she had a slight accent.

"You look like you could use a cup of warming tea, my dear."

"That sounds…" Hermione trailed off, for there was something strange about the young wizard before her. He was terribly handsome, with a long, straight nose and piercing dark eyes. He blinked at her, and Hermione forced her eyes back to the witch. "Tea would be nice. Thank you. I… erm, I didn't realise this shop was still open."

"Still?" The older witch, presumably Madam Amaranth, laughed darkly as she moved over to a teapot. With a wand and a few pots of herbs, she set about the task of making Hermione's tea. "It is only nine in the morning, my dear; Tom is my first customer of the day."

"I meant…" Hermione licked her bottom lip. She met the wizard's eyes again, and all of a sudden her mind was flooded with the rush of a thought - Harry and Ron and Hermione at the party the night before, screaming in celebration as the new year clicked over. George Weasley had arranged for the explosive display of confetti, glitter, and the numbers _2000_ bursting into the air above the party. Everyone was cheering, yelling about the new Millennium. Hermione frowned deeply and shoved the thought away, and she turned back to Madam Amaranth. The older witch slid a cup of herbal tea on a saucer toward Hermione and said,

"Cinnamon, clove, and ginger tea, my dear. It'll warm you."

Hermione sipped at the tea and nodded. "Thank you kindly."

"Sorry; what did you say your name was?" The wizard, who looked to be just about Hermione's age, stood up straighter, and she cleared her throat.

"I'm Hermione Granger, actually," she said, rather self-consciously. Ever since the Battle of Hogwarts, her fame had sometimes been a bit much to bear. Her cheeks went hot, from the tea and from embarrassment. "Yes, _that_ Hermione Granger."

"Not familiar," said the wizard, narrowing his eyes. Madam Amaranth likewise showed no recognition at the sound of Hermione's name. But that was impossible. Hermione set down her teacup, suddenly feeling _exceedingly_ uneasy. Every single person in the wizarding world knew of Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger. But this young wizard, who seemed vaguely familiar to Hermione, and of a similar age, and whose name was apparently _Tom_, was eyeing her sceptically now, as though he was just confused by her presence. Hermione shut her eyes and took a shaking breath. She opened her eyes, steeled herself, wished with all her might that what she suspected would not be true, and said,

"Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mister…"

"Riddle," said the young wizard lightly, and Hermione's stomach twisted. She felt very ill, all of a sudden. She pursed her lips and felt the room spin. She shook her head a little and asked in a hoarse voice,

"What is the date?"

"Bit hungover, are we? Explains the lack of outerwear. The ginger will help," said Madam Amaranth. "New Year's Eves are rough on everybody, eh, Tom?"

"Indeed," said the young man who would grow to become Lord Voldemort. He met Hermione's eyes and said very deliberately, "Cheers to 1947."

"1947," Hermione whispered. She wrenched her eyes shut and stumbled away from the counter, feeling frantic and desperate. She tried to Disapparate, to go back to her flat in London. She whirled hard to her right, thinking of her bed with the rose-patterned sheets, of Ron Weasley's sleeping form beside her. She deliberated hard, and she turned, and she fell with a _thunk_ on the floor of the shop. Suddenly she was being helped up, hauled by the strong arms of Tom Marvolo Riddle himself, and when she glared up at him, he nodded and said quietly,

"Long way from home, aren't you, Miss Granger?"

She dashed away from him, running out of the shop, flinging the door open and hurtling herself back out into Knockturn Alley without another word. She hobbled over to a brick wall and leaned against it, slamming her fists frustratedly as she tried to figure out what had happened and what to do about it - and what to do about _him_.

**Author's Note: I have decided, after a very long period of writing almost ****exclusively ****Bellamort** **stories, to take a break from that ship to refresh my ****own ****creativity. I am returning to Tomione, a ship I've loved for a long time, and am looking forward to writing this ****fic****. I hope you'll join me and that you'll leave feedback as you read. Please ****do be aware** **that a ****fully-illustrated** **version of my completed Tomione work **_**All The Wrong Choices**_ **is ****currently ****in progress with a fantastic commissioned artist, and as soon as that project ****is done****, it will be available to view online as a complete illustrated work. Thanks for having me back as a Tomione writer. Let's do this!**


	2. Chapter 2

Hermione sat in the White Wyvern, studying the wooden table as her stomach grumbled.

"You sure I can't get you nothing to eat?" asked the witch in an apron who was circulating among the tables. Hermione opened her mouth, her eyes welling as she stared up at the witch.

"It's not that I'm not hungry," she said, for she hadn't eaten in well over a day now. "It's just that I haven't got any money. I'm, erm… perhaps if you've got any scraps from the kitchen, or -"

"If you can't pay, you can't eat," snapped the witch, and she was about to storm off when she raised her face. Her harsh expression softened, and she smiled warmly. "Mr Riddle. Good morning."

"Morning, Celia. I'd like my usual breakfast, if you please. Miss Granger, would eggs with a scone and rashers suit you? Or something else?"

Hermione narrowed her eyes up at Tom Riddle, who had appeared beside her table. She was so hungry it felt like her stomach was eating itself. She gulped and contemplated the consequences of accepting money from the wizard who would become Lord Voldemort, but finally she said,

"That sounds just fine."

"Thank you, Celia." Tom Riddle slid into the chair opposite Hermione and scanned his eyes up and down her form. He must have realised she was wearing the same awkwardly Transfigured shift dress she'd been wearing the day before in Madam Amaranth's Herbs. Hermione had repeated all the Transfiguration and Scouring spells upon herself early this morning in the mysterious flat after spending all of the previous day and night desperately attempting to find her way back home.

"I mean no offense, but you look tired and hungry, Miss Granger," said Tom. He folded his hands on the table. "Is time travel as exhausting as that?"

Hermione gnawed her lip and demanded, "What do you know about what happened to me?"

"All I know, Miss Granger," said Tom, "is that a young witch came walking, cold and confused, into the herb shop. And I perceived from her the notion of a millennium ticking over anew, of more strangers celebrating a new year that will not come to pass for decades."

Hermione's lips parted. "Because you're a Legilimens. You looked into my head and saw… of course you did."

"You seem oddly familiar with me." Tom tipped his head to the side. "You showed recognition, almost fear, when I revealed my surname to you. You seem unsurprised to learn that I searched your mind. Tell me why."

"No, I do not think I will," Hermione scowled, furrowing her brows as she wondered if she was about to lose herself her free breakfast. But breakfast turned out to be the least of her concerns. She felt a rush inside of her mind, and all of a sudden thoughts were racing through her brain.

_Harry, Ron, and Hermione were discussing the destruction of Tom Riddle's diary using a Basilisk fang… Hermione was trying to destroy the locket Horcrux in the Forest of Dean… Lord Voldemort, grey and snake-like, was slumping down in death after the Elder Wand refused to kill Harry. _

Hermione gripped the edge of the table in the White Wyvern and just stared at the young wizard opposite her. He gave her, in return, an alarming lack of emotion, and instead he just nodded and affirmed,

"You know much. Everything. You know everything."

"I suppose my usefulness to you extends as far as your ability to interrogate me." Hermione sniffed a bit and guessed lightly, "One of your lingering loyalists must have Cursed me to send me back. They wanted you to see my memories of your path so that you could avoid the mistakes that led to your downfall, I think."

"This is the conclusion you have reached over the last day and night of hungry sleeplessness?" Tom posited. Hermione opened her mouth to answer, but then the serving witch came back with a platter. She set down a plate of food before each of them, and gave both Tom and Hermione glasses of pumpkin juice. Hermione nodded tightly to thank the witch, but she refused to extend any gratitude as Tom held out a few coins to pay.

Once the serving witch had gone, Hermione gulped and surmised,

"You're going to murder me."

"Don't be silly, Miss Granger. Do eat your eggs; you're positively famished."

Hermione chomped a lip. She did not care for being bossed about, much less by a wizard, least of all by Tom Marvolo Riddle. But she was hungrier than she could ever recall being, so she broke the yolks of her eggs and used her fork to bring them into her mouth. She chewed as Tom poked at his own food and said,

"I can tell, quite plainly, that you did not mean to travel through time at all, let alone through many decades. Such time travel is not only illegal and dangerous, it's also incredibly difficult magic and is only recorded to have ever happened by accident. Perhaps someone did Curse you. Or perhaps some external force sent you back against your will. What is obvious is that you did not intend on being here. And that you've got no money."

"But I have got all sorts of information," Hermione said, chewing a bite of scone and swigging some pumpkin juice, "and so I'm sure once you've extracted all the memories from me that you need, you'll kill me, or Obliviate me if you're feeling uncharacteristically merciful."

"Or perhaps I shall recruit you," Tom Riddle began, and Hermione spluttered into her glass of pumpkin juice, actually spitting a bit out in amused shock. Tom did not smile as Hermione cackled and dragged her wrist over her lips.

"That's rich," she told him. "Recruit me? I know who you are, Tom Riddle."

"Do you really, though?" He tipped his head again and dragged a fingertip over the edge of his plate. Hermione was about to spit venom at him, to say that nobody knew Voldemort better than one of the witches who had fought hardest to defeat him. She was a noted heroine, she wanted to say, famous for her deeds in the conflict against Tom Marvolo Riddle. Of course she knew him. But before she could speak, he picked up his fork, punctured an egg yolk, and murmured,

"You know what you lived. But I very much doubt that any young Tom Riddle in that existence had been visited by a time traveling enemy from his future. And, anyway, you knew what appeared to be a broken, old creature. You did not know… me."

"I have no wish to become better acquainted with you, Tom," Hermione snapped. "I'm going home."

"Are you?" His voice was airy. "How?"

"I…" Hermione felt her ears go hot. She thought of Ron, of her position at the Ministry, of her bed with its rose-patterned sheets. "I will find a way."

"And in the meantime, until you manage to unearth a safe and reliable method of traveling fifty-three years into the future, shall I plan on continuing to fund your meals so that you do not starve?" Tom drummed his fingers on the table. Hermione narrowed her eyes and pushed her chair back, snatching her scone off her plate.

"I'll find my own money."

She turned around and stalked quickly away without another word, leaving Tom Riddle alone at the table.

* * *

"Good morning," Hermione said, walking into Goshawk's Quills and Ink on Diagon Alley. The tiny shop had been open in Hermione's time, too, a specialty retailer of high-end writing implements such as self-inking quills, metallic and disappearing inks, and quills made from the feathers of rare Beasts. Hermione moved between the narrow displays of slick black pots and beautiful quills as a stern-looking wizard with shoulder-length curls stared at her.

"How may I assist you?" The wizard droned. Hermione smiled a bit and said,

"I am in search of employment. I am wondering whether you have any need of help here at Goshawk's; I am very qualified and knowledgeable about -"

"We are not hiring," the wizard said sharply. "This is a family operation."

Hermione huffed a breath. So many of the shops she'd tried this morning were "family operations." Robe shops, tea shops, potions suppliers, and just about everybody else seemed to shutter their hiring practises to anyone unrelated to the owner.

Hermione had gone to the Ministry of Magic just after breakfast and had enquired about any position at all they might have, but she'd been told there were no openings at all, not even for custodial or clerical work. Here on Diagon Alley, Mr Fortescue had told her that the reason jobs were so hard to come by was that everybody had transitioned away from the conflict with Grindelwald back to "normal life," and that ordinary positions were therefore scarce.

"Well. Thank you, anyway," Hermione said a bit dejectedly to the wizard in Goshawk's Quills and Ink. She turned to go, but the wizard said,

"I heard Mr Caractacus Burke needs another shop assistant. Flora Greengrass, that girl who was working there… well, you know."

He bowed his head, and Hermione frowned. She shook her head. She did not know. What had happened to Flora Greengrass? The wizard gave her a heavy look and said,

"She took ill and _died; _didn't you hear?"

"Oh. How horrid." Hermione puffed out a breath and tried to calibrate the idea of working in Borgin and Burkes. It was a shop of almost entirely Dark artefacts, and Hermione was loathe to be associated with it. But it seemed she had little choice. She put her lips into a line, reminded herself that she _would_ find a way home, and nodded.

"Thank you kindly for the recommendation. I'm sorry. I didn't get your name."

"Oh. It's Nathal Goshawk. Please, take no offense, but I can't say that I've met you before, either, Miss…?"

He cocked up an eyebrow, pushing back his curls from his shoulder. Hermione swallowed hard and said,

"Granger. Hermione Granger."

"Right." Mr Goshawk seemed confused, but he recommended, "Go and see Mr Burke. Tell him I sent you."

"Thank you," Hermione said again, and she headed out into Diagon Alley. She walked toward the place where Diagon Alley led down to Knockturn Alley, and she hesitated. She stood at the brick archway and sighed, then stepped down, feeling the cold January air wash over her. She walked past a shop whose window display consisted entirely of a variety of skulls, then by the studio of a self-proclaimed Seer-Medium specialising in séances.

Finally, she arrived at Borgin and Burkes, and Hermione opened the door as a bell tinkled overhead. She shut the door behind her and looked around at the dusty, ominous-looking objects that crowded shelves and cases.

"Well, well," said a voice, and Hermione startled as Tom Riddle came stalking out from behind a door that appeared to lead to a back room. "I'm surprised it took you this long, Miss Granger."

"Whatever do you mean?" she snapped, but he smirked and planted his hands on the glass display case before him.

"You," he said, "are in desperate need of employment in what is indisputably a dreadful job market. We happen to be hiring."

"Oh, no." Hermione shook her head vehemently and started toward the door. "I'm not working with you."

"Have you already enquired at the Ministry?" Tom asked smoothly from behind her, and Hermione froze with her hand on the doorknob. He continued, "The shops on Diagon Alley? You've done your due diligence before coming here, I suppose."

Hermione shut her eyes and shook her head. She was going to find a way home, she reminded herself. She had to get back to Ron, to her real life. She had to get away from the young wizard who would become Lord Voldemort. But here, where she was trapped, she had no money at all.

"Give me just a moment," she heard Tom Riddle say, "and I shall fetch Mr Burke."

**Author's Note: Boy, howdy! It sure feels great to be writing Tomione again! As you can see, this one will be a slow burn. I hope you'll stick with me. I promise very frequent updates, and your feedback incredibly appreciated!**


	3. Chapter 3

Caractacus Burke was a wizened old man, stooped and white-haired with thick spectacles before his cloudy eyes. He had been long dead, Hermione knew, by the time she'd been alive. In her own time, this shop had been run by Alois Borgin, the descendent of the co-founder. But today, here in 1947, Caractacus Burke appeared to be the one administering Borgin and Burkes at a very advanced age.

"Hello, Mr Burke," said Hermione cautiously. Caractacus Burke studied her through the sturdy lenses of his glasses and muttered to Tom Riddle,

"How did you say you knew her again?"

"Miss Granger and I are recently acquainted," Tom said smoothly. "In the chaos of the last great conflict, she lost her family, and she is self-taught with magic."

"You didn't attend Hogwarts, girl?" Caractacus Burke squawked accusingly. Hermione was about to protest that she'd done quite a lot at Hogwarts, _thank you_, but she quickly realised that nobody in this time would have any memory of her at the school. Tom's slick, easy lie made sense. So Hermione just nodded and japed,

"I've probably read five times as many books as any formal student would have done. And I'm quite skilled with practical and theoretical magic. I, erm… I know first hand what both Dark and Light feel like, in the magical world."

Burke nodded slowly. "You seek employment."

"I do." Hermione gulped. "I'll take any position you've got on offer, sir."

"Tom's busy these days seeking out new artefacts for the shop to sell," said Burke. "As for me, I spend most of my time in my old age napping with the Wizarding Wireless on. I could use a shop girl, someone to wrap up sold parcels and sweep the floors, someone to Scour the windows in the morning. Things like that."

That sounded simple enough, so Hermione nodded vigorously. "Thank you, sir."

"It'll pay five Galleons a week," Burke said. Hermione pinched her lip. She wasn't really certain how much food and drink cost in the wake of Grindelwald's war and the Second World War of the Muggle world. She also did not know whether she would be expected to pay any rent for the mysterious flat where she'd awakened. She needed clothes, too. Hopefully five Galleons a week would be enough. It was certainly better than nothing.

"I recall, Mr Burke," said Tom Riddle delicately, "that when I was first hired here, you gave me a month's pay to help get me started."

"But you had just graduated Hogwarts, Tom, and you had no family, nowhere else to go," protested Burke. Hermione opened her mouth to interject, but Burke finally wheezed out a breath and said, "Very well. Miss Granger, is it? You may have fifteen Galleons upfront, with five Galleons weekly thereafter."

"Thank you, Mr Burke," Hermione said. "I promise I shall work diligently for you."

"See that you do," said Mr Burke, "or you shall be swiftly replaced. There are plenty looking for work. I'm taking you on on a provisional basis; you must prove yourself."

"Yes, sir," Hermione affirmed.

"Show the girl about, Tom. And count her fifteen Galleons from the till." Burke stepped away then, pushing open the door to the back room and stalking through the archway with uneven, wobbly steps. Once the door had shut, Hermione glared at Tom Riddle and crossed her arms over her chest.

"Why did you do that?"

"Do what?" Tom asked lightly. He ambled toward the heavy brass till. He opened a wooden drawer and pulled out a small black velvet bag, and Hermione huffed,

"Why did you make up a lie about me not going to school, first of all?"

"So that Mr Burke would hire you." Tom opened the till and began counting gold Galleon coins into the velvet bag.

"And the _signing bonus?_" Hermione demanded sharply. "Why do you care if I've got money?"

Tom raised his dark eyes to Hermione and shrugged. He smirked a little, dropping two more coins into the bag. He pulled the bag shut and closed the drawer of the till. He handed over the bag of coins to Hermione and asked,

"Are you very cross with me?"

"You're just trying to manipulate me. I see straight through you, Tom Riddle." Hermione snatched the bag and opened it. She started counting coins, and she frowned as she muttered, "But you've given me too much; there are eighteen Galleons here."

She pulled out three Galleons and slammed them down onto the counter between Tom and herself. He raised an eyebrow at her and suggested,

"Use it for an extra pair of wool stockings or something."

"I'm no thief. Put the money back in the till," Hermione snarled. Tom licked his bottom lip and sighed, taking the three Galleons. He reached beneath his outer robe and tucked the Galleons into his trouser pocket. Hermione scoffed and shook her head. _Thief_, she thought. _Madman, murderer. _

"Madman," he repeated softly, and she realised he'd been inside her head. She snapped her face up until her eyes met his, and she held up one finger as she took a half step back.

"Rule Number One," she said as sternly as she could manage. "You will _not_ use Legilimency on me. At all. Ever."

"You're making rules now, are you, time traveller?" Tom sounded a little amused. He drummed his fingers on the glass case and asked, "What are your other rules, then?"

"No attacking me," Hermione said, her voice shaking a little. Tom guffawed a bit then and demanded,

"What, you think I'm just going to hurl some spell at your back whilst you're arranging the merchandise?"

"And why wouldn't you?" Hermione asked defensively. She looked around the shop as if to make certain they were alone, and then she hissed, "I know what you're going to become. I know the things Lord Voldemort will do. And I will gleefully watch you die, after devoting months of my life to seeking out and destroying your Horcruxes."

Tom's face went a bit pale then, and his lips parted like he meant to speak. But then the door of Borgin and Burkes opened, and the bell tinkled. Hermione whirled around and saw a sturdy blond wizard, his long hair neatly tied back, come walking into the shop. There was something familiar in his powder blue eyes, in his thin lips, and he was very evidently wealthy, if his impeccably tailored winter cloak was any indication. Hermione realised at once who he was, and she was unsurprised when Tom Riddle greeted the wizard,

"Abraxas."

Abraxas Malfoy. Lucius' father and Draco's grandfather. Hermione panicked internally; this was one of the few recognisable names she was encountering in 1947. She nodded in greeting as Abraxas Malfoy walked with imperious steps into Borgin and Burkes, surveying the shop as if he owned it.

"Hello, Tom," said Abraxas. "I've come for my mother's birthday gift; did you have a chance to procure it in time?"

"Of course. I think you'll be very pleased, and so will she." Tom turned round and opened a cupboard behind the counter, pulling out a box. Abraxas Malfoy looked Hermione up and down, his pale eyes glinting.

"And who might you be?"

"This is Hermione Granger. She's just starting work in the shop today," Tom said, rifling through the cupboard.

"Oh, indeed?" Abraxas seemed a little hungry as he eyed Hermione. But then his eyes settled on her left hand, on her fourth finger where Ron Weasley had put a simple gold band with a small diamond. Hermione touched at her engagement ring, and Abraxas noted, "So sorry; I don't remember you from Hogwarts. Beauxbatons lady, were you?"

"Self-instructed," Hermione said, feeling defensive in the lie, "owing to the wars."

"Ah. I see. Well. I'm sure Mr Riddle and Mr Burke will make you feel quite at home in the shop," said Abraxas.

"Mr Malfoy and I were good friends at school." Tom Riddle shut the cupboard door and finally turned round with what appeared to be an Ollivander's wand box. He set it on the counter and explained to Hermione, "Abraxas requested a specific ancestor's wand as a gift for his mother. It took me quite a while to track the wand down, but I've got it."

Hermione frowned. "Aren't people usually buried with their wands?"

Tom dragged his fingers over the box on the counter and murmured, "Yes, usually. Have a look, Abraxas."

Hermione's stomach twisted a little with unease as Abraxas Malfoy opened the wand box and peeled back the sheer ribbons. He pulled out a long, slender, simple wand with a shimmering golden leaf pattern on the wood. He smiled and set the wand back in the box, and Tom said to Hermione,

"Come and wrap this up for Mr Malfoy. The supplies are right here."

She felt terrible _obeying_ the man who would become Lord Voldemort. She felt awful as she neatly bound paper and twine around the box and then used spells to change the colours so they were more festive for a birthday. And as she put the parcel in a canvas bag and handed it over, it took everything she had to give Abraxas Malfoy a little smile and say politely,

"Pleasure to meet you."

"And you. I do hope we will be seeing more of one another, Miss Granger." Abraxas reached into his robes and pulled out a heavy-looking bag of coins. He pushed it across the counter to Tom and confirmed, "Fifty Galleons was the price?"

"Thank you." Tom opened the till and dumped the bag in without counting the coins. But he wouldn't need to count them, Hermione thought. He would be able to tell if Abraxas had been cheating.

She managed to make it through the rest of the work day, somehow. Tom Riddle showed her where the "valuable" objects were, the ones whose prices necessitated Mr Burke's presence for sale. He explained to her that, for now, she should fetch Tom or Mr Burke if someone came in with an item for sale. Other than that, he said, she should keep the place Scoured and free of pests that might get into the merchandise. Then he left, saying he had to go in search of a highly sought-after ruby pendant in Cornwall. Hermione spent the next five hours getting the shop spic and span, selling a cheap pair of onyx earrings to an old witch, and wondering how she was going to get home.

By the time Mr Burke gruffly told her to leave and come back in the morning, Hermione felt like crying. She was out of ideas. She did not have access to a Time Turner here, but -

Dumbledore.

She needed to get in contact with Albus Dumbledore, she thought. He would understand how urgently she needed to get home. He would know how to do it. He would help her escape this time and make her way back to the year 2000.

Hermione practically sprinted out of Knockturn Alley and up into Diagon Alley, but by the time she reached Goshawk's Quills and Ink, the sign on the door read _Closed._ Hermione's heart sank until she saw Nathal Goshawk moving inside the shop. Hermione rapped desperately on the door and watched him turn round. Nathal scowled a bit but headed for the door, and when he reached it and opened it, Hermione breathlessly said,

"Please, Me Goshawk. I need your help."

"Erm. All right. Come inside." Nathal stepped aside, and Hermione followed him into the shop. She started rambling then.

"I need to buy parchment, ink, a quill, an envelope… I need… erm, somehow I need to borrow an owl or something so that I can -"

"I've got an owl you can use. And parchment, and loads of quills. Sending a letter?" Nathal Goshawk dragged his fingers through his shoulder-length ringlets, and Hermione nodded.

"Yes, but it's rather… confidential."

Nathal's face softened. "I understand. Is the recipient someone bright enough to deal with Disappearing Ink?"

Hermione scoffed, thinking of just how brilliant Dumbledore was. She nodded. "Oh, yes. He's bright enough."

Soon, she was set up at a desk in the back of Goshawk's Quills and Ink with a parchment, an elegant quill, and a pot of clear Disappearing Ink. Nathal gracefully said he had work to do in the shop, and Hermione wrote as quickly as she could.

_Dear Professor Dumbledore,_

_My name is Hermione Granger. I will be born in the year 1979 to Muggle parents, and then become a Gryffindor at Hogwarts. Over the course of my school career, I will see and do a great many unusu things, not the least of them participating in the downfall of the Dark wizard Lord Voldemort, who was born Tom Marvolo Riddle. _

_Very early in the morning on New Year's Day, in the year 2000, I fell asleep in my London flat with my fiancé. I awakened alone in a building in Knockturn Alley in the year 1947. I have attempted every action I know - from creating Portkeys to Apparition - in order to get back home. In my third year of study, I made regular use of a Time Turner, but I have no access to one here, and am not certain whether or not it would work._

_Please, Professor, I beg you to assist me. I am lost. I must escape the world of Tom Riddle as he was before he became Lord Voldemort. I must get back home. Please help me get back home._

_Sincerely,_

_Hermione Granger_

Hermione folded the letter, put it into an envelope, and addressed it to Albus Dumbledore at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She sealed the letter shut with wax and hoped nobody would find it, hoped she could trust Nathal Goshawk. She did not let the letter out of her sight until Nathal's owl was soaring over the rooftops of Diagon Alley.

"Thank you." Hermione stood near the shop door and reached for her little purse of coins, but Nathal insisted,

"It's no problem. Really. All I saw was that it was a letter to Albus Dumbledore, and that's enough for me." He flashed her a warm little smile, and Hermione suddenly felt the first flush of friendship go through her veins since coming to this time. She knew the feel of friendship well. She had felt its warm glow from Harry and Ron, even from Ginny and Luna and Neville. Would she feel it here before she managed to get home?

"Thanks again," Hermione said. "I'm going to try to see if Madam Malkin's is still open."

"Madam Malkin's," repeated Nathal Goshawk in confusion. Hermione shut her eyes. She remembered the way, when she'd gone job hunting, that the storefront where Madam Malkin's would eventually be had been occupied by a shop called Signor Alfredo's Continental Attire For All Needs.

"I, erm… I need some clothes. Cheap clothes, preferably," Hermione said.

"There's the second-hand robe shop in Knockturn Alley," Nathal Goshawk said cautiously. "Rebound Reused and Repurposed Robes."

"How… alliterative." Hermione nodded. "Thanks, Nathal." She turned to go. From behind her, Nathal called,

"Good evening, Miss Granger."

Hermione made her way back toward Knockturn Alley. She found the used robe shop and hunted among the racks until she'd put together five skirts, three blouses, two outer robes, socks, and shoes. She decided to keep her Conjured undergarments, unwilling to wear someone's used knickers. Hermione carried her haul of clothes up to the front desk, where a witch with blonde braids sucked on a candy and mused,

"Two Galleons for all this."

"Is that all?" Hermione frowned, reaching into her bag. The witch quirked up an eyebrow.

"None of it's new, darling. This blouse has a little rip in the sleeve."

"But I can easily mend that. Oh, all right. Thanks." Hermione plunked two Galleons down on the counter and willfully took the pile of clothes in the large brown paper sack the shop witch gave her. When she left the robe shop, she debated going back out to Diagon Alley to eat at the Leaky Cauldron, but her flat was quite close, and the White Wyvern was just around the corner. So she climbed the stairs to the pub and found a table, sliding into the booth and setting down her bag of second-hand clothes.

"What'll it be?" croaked a very old wizard who walked up to the table. Hermione sighed and said,

"A Butterbeer and a meat pie, if you please."

The very old wizard ambled away, and Hermione let out a shaking sigh. She stared at her folded hands on the table and contemplated just what had happened to her. She was so far from home, just like Tom Riddle had said. Her fiancé, her best friends, were gone. Her flat and her job were gone. And she was trapped in a time and place fresh off of a wizarding and a Muggle war, a place where Tom Marvolo Riddle was still working in Borgin and Burkes.

Hermione's eyes began to well heavily. She studied at her thumbnail and thought of Ron. She thought of Harry. She thought of Hogwarts, of the Horcruxes, of the battles in which she'd been a combatant. She thought of ringing in the new millennium, of waking up in 1947.

And then she shut her eyes and wondered where Nathal Goshawk's owl was right now, hoping with all her might that Professor Dumbledore would help her find her way home.

**Author's Note: I realize I'm updating REALLY quickly right now. I appreciate you reading with me and would be exceedingly grateful for your comments.**


	4. Chapter 4

Hermione woke to the _tap, tap, tap_ of an owl beak on the window of the Knockturn Alley flat. She flung herself out of bed and rushed over to the window, unlatching it and pushing it open. She let the brown owl hop inside, and she untied the envelope from its foot.

_To Miss Hermione Granger_, it read on the outside. Hermione opened the envelope and pulled out the letter inside as the owl flapped its wings into flight, soaring away. She shut the window with one hand to keep out the frigid air, and then she read the letter she'd unfolded.

_Miss Granger,_

_I am distressed to learn of your accidental travel through such a great leap of time. As I am sure you are very well aware, there is absolutely no stable or moral method of returning you to "your" time using known travel techniques. The mechanical limits on Time Turners and the laws against time travel are in place for a reason: massive jumps through the years result in catastrophic damage to timelines when retrieval is attempted._

_Therefore, Miss Granger, I regretfully inform you that I will be making no attempt to assist you in travelling forward in time._

_However, you wrote of a particularly grim and frightening future involving Tom Riddle. I confess that I have borne suspicions about the young man for years, and you have confirmed my worst fears. I should like to meet with you to discuss a few matters, so that perhaps appropriate action may be taken in hopes of preventing unnecessary violence and conflict in the years to come. I do hope you will contribute to the cause of crafting a world of peace where you remember war._

_Be safe in this new world. We shall meet soon. In the meantime, get used to your surroundings. I do not suppose you will be going anywhere any time soon._

_Yours very sincerely,_

_Albus Dumbledore_

Hermione touched at her lips and set the letter down on the windowsill. She shut her eyes and sighed. So Dumbledore wasn't going to help her. More than that, the great Albus Dumbledore was telling her that there was precisely no safe way for her to ever go back home. Hermione thought of Ron. She thought of Harry and Ginny, of her flat with its tiny kitchen and its rosy bedroom. She thought of her work in the Ministry. All of that, the life she'd built in the wake of defeating Lord Voldemort, was gone. Was it even real anymore, or had the timeline been destroyed already by virtue of Hermione travelling here? She had no way of knowing. Perhaps Ron and Harry had been Un-Born. Perhaps they had married other people in an alternate timeline she'd accidentally created by coming here. How could she know for certain? All she knew now was that she was stuck, rightly and truly, in 1947.

But she could help, she thought. She could meet with Albus Dumbledore and show him everything. He was a skilled Legilimens, too; he'd be able to go into her mind and see all the memories of Hermione, Harry, and Ron hunting down and destroying Voldemort's Horcruxes. He'd be able to see the way Voldemort had been reborn into a grey, snake-like body after his disappearance, the way he'd fought Harry on the grounds of Hogwarts and died. She could show Dumbledore absolutely everything, and then Dumbledore could stop it all from happening.

Of course, that meant that timelines would radically shift and warp. Hermione wondered distantly, for example, whether Harry would have been born if Voldemort hadn't been ascending during Snape and the Marauders' school years. She wondered what Neville would have been like if Bellatrix Lestrange hadn't tortured his parents into oblivion, forcing Neville's grandmother to raise him. She wondered what relations between Purebloods and Muggle-borns would look like in the year 2000 had Voldemort's movement never happened. Would some other radical have moved in instead?

Hermione found herself frowning just a little where she stood, wondering for some reason if she ought to show Dumbledore absolutely _everything. _She remembered now what Harry Potter had told her about his Occlumency lessons with Professor Snape in their fifth year. The lessons hadn't gone very well for Harry, but Snape had imparted the theory of Occlumency, at least.

_You have to clear your mind of all emotion, and try not to think at all, _Harry had said in the Gryffindor Common Room one night. _The moment you feel the tug of somebody pulling at your thoughts, you've got to sort of physically shove them out and replace the thoughts with… I dunno, like, a blank night._

Hermione pinched her lips and read Dumbledore's letter twice more. He was not going to help her get home, and she was not certain what it would mean to tell him absolutely everything she knew. Nor did she have any inclination to share her thoughts with Tom Riddle. Hermione glanced at the ticking clock on the wall and saw that it was only half past six. Plenty of time, then, she thought, to practise shoring up her mind before breakfast.

She had memories to protect.

* * *

"_Scourgify._" Hermione aimed her wand at a dusty shelf, dragging it from right to left. The shelf cleaned itself up, and the display of crystal balls upon it began to gleam. Hermione crouched down to the shelf below it, upon which there was an old brass kaleidoscope of some kind and a jar full of shells from poisonous snails. Hermione Scoured that shelf and then slowly stood, complaining,

"The displays are so haphazard. How could anybody find anything in here?"

"I suppose one just browses," Tom Riddle drawled from behind the counter. Hermione turned around to face him, and she could see that he was aiming his wand at a glass bottle, muttering spells. Checking for Curses, she thought.

"One of these days, I'm going to reorganise these displays," Hermione said determinedly. Tom nodded and stares at the green glass bottle.

"All right. _Fiero Revelio… _Gah!" He suddenly recoiled and dropped his wand onto the counter, and Hermione saw his dark eyes flash. Tom clutched his right hand with his left one and whispered a few choice swear words under his breath as Hermione rushed over to the counter. She stared at the bottle, then realised it had been Cursed to burn a handler.

"Here. Let me." She aimed her wand at his blistering right hand and incanted smoothly, "_Reparifors. Episkey. Antifieri."_

He didn't thank her. He just seemed to wait for the pain of the burn to abate, and then he reached for his wand again and pursed his lips.

"_Accio _glass jar." A large container came soaring off the shelf to Tom's right, and he carefully Levitated the Cursed glass bottle into the larger jar. He put the lid on, then nonverbally Conjured a little label for the jar and used a spell to neatly write upon it - _Cursed to Burn._

"Go ahead and put that on display. If anyone asks, the price is, erm… seven Galleons, I should think," Tom said. Hermione huffed and rolled her eyes, Levitating the jar to a display shelf. This shop really was mad, she thought. She knew Tom had gone grave-robbing to get Abraxas Malfoy his ancestor's wand. She knew this place sold poisons and weapons and Cursed objects. So why did she work here?

Because she didn't have any choice, she reminded herself. She had nowhere else to go.

"When are you meeting with Dumbledore?" Tom asked from behind the counter, and Hermione's mouth fell open in angry shock. She whirled toward him, stalking forward a few steps, and reminded him,

"I told you to stay out of my head."

"Sorry; his letter was pushed forth rather insistently," Tom sniffed. He drummed his fingers on the glass counter and noted, "I am surprised that a witch as bright as you seem to be honestly thought there would be a way for you to go back."

Hermione wrenched her eyes shut and thrust Tom Riddle clear out of her head, with a visceral sort of shove. She took the thoughts and emotions in her mind - righteous indignation and ideas about Dumbledore's letter - and replaced them with a velvet, inky blackness. She opened her eyes, and Tom looked very surprised indeed.

"You're an Occlumens."

"Self-taught, owing to the wars," Hermione said a bit mockingly. Tom nodded slowly. His eyes flicked to her left hand, just like Abraxas' gaze had done, and he asked smoothly,

"Is he the redhead or the one with the glasses? Your fiancé?"

Hermione narrowed her eyes at Tom, balling her hands into fists at her sides. "Does it matter?" Her eyes seared terribly then. "I'm never going to see him again anyway."

"Ron. Harry," Tom said quietly, lowering his eyes, and Hermione stormed toward him. She reached right across the glass counter and slapped Tom across the cheek as hard as she could. He looked a bit surprised by the violence, but Hermione hissed,

"Don't you dare speak their names, _Lord Voldemort._"

Tom opened his mouth, but the shop door opened, and Hermione turned to see an elegant witch, very richly dressed, come walking in. She swept into the shop and flashed Tom a chilly little smile, then flicked her eyes up and down Hermione and said,

"Good day."

"Walburga Black," Tom greeted, and Hermione knew it was for her benefit. She almost gasped. This was Sirius Black's mother. She was young and beautiful, but seemed very cold, her dark hair adorned with a silk covering and her robes and cloak intensely traditional. Walburga walked slowly into the shop and eyed Hermione with suspicion.

"May I introduce Miss Hermione Granger?" Tom said lightly, and Walburga quite literally turned her nose up as she asked,

"Granger? Is that a Muggle name? I've not heard it."

Hermione glared at Walburga, but before she could say anything, Tom pointed out,

"Nobody had heard the name _Riddle_ before I went to Hogwarts, Walburga, but Orion and Cygnus got awfully used to it. What brings you into the shop today?"

"I came on my brother Cygnus' behalf," Walburga said lightly. She reached into her heavy cloak and pulled out a scroll, handing it over to Tom. "He is having a twenty-first birthday party, and he insisted that you must be there. He asked me to deliver your invitation in person. He'd have come himself, but he's still in France on Ministry business."

"I look forward to it," Tom smiled. Walburga sneered a bit at Hermione, seeming to assess the secondhand nature of her clothes, and she lied,

"Such a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

Hermione just nodded. She thought to herself what Sirius had revealed about his mother - that she'd always been a bitter Pureblood extremist, but that she and her cousin-husband Orion had never fully joined Voldemort's ranks. As Walburga turned and swished out of Borgin and Burkes, Hermione found herself numbly noting,

"I don't think she likes either one of us."

"No?" Tom sounded amused. "I don't think Walburga likes anybody, so I'm not taking it personally. Oh, I do despise parties, but they are important for networking purposes."

He was reading the invitation, Hermione could see now. She scowled at him and snapped,

"Yes, and we all know how very important _your_ networking opportunities are."

He raised his eyebrows at her and just stared for a moment. Suddenly Hermione found herself thinking of the moment Ron had proposed marriage, the instant he'd slid her engagement ring onto her finger. She shut her eyes and filled her mind with darkness, pushing away the joy she'd felt that day. When she opened her eyes again, they were heavy with tears, and she snarled,

"Ron. His name is Ronald Bilius Weasley. Are you happy now?"

Tom shrugged and turned away. He opened a cupboard and seemed to be searching for something, and he asked again,

"So when are you meeting with Dumbledore to tell him all about my Horcruxes and my awful death?"

Hermione bristled. She tipped her chin up and tapped her fingers on the counter. "I don't know yet. But when I do meet with him, I am going to tell him everything he needs to know to stop you from destroying lives the way you did."

"Hmm." Tom finally pulled something out of the cupboard and turned around. He set a little box down on the counter and opened the lid, and inside, on a bed of worn-looking velvet, lay an elaborate but tarnished silver pendant. Hermione was cautious as she picked the pendant up, for she'd watched Tom burn himself on a glass bottle earlier. She studied the pendant and realised it was a crest, a family crest. There was quite a lot of decoration that had been rubbed down through the centuries, but Hermione could just make out the name on the banner.

_Weasley._

Her bottom lip shook ferociously as she listened to Tom say,

"The Weasleys are Purebloods, but poor. Mr Burke bought that off of Thaddius Weasley last year. It's at least three hundred years old. I'd just give it to you and Confound Mr Burke into forgetting about it, but something tells me you wouldn't consider that much of a gift."

Hermione raised her eyes to Tom and set the crest necklace back in its case. She shut the lid and said quietly,

"You are not human."

Tom frowned. He took the box, turned round, and put it back in the cupboard.

"I am a great many things, Hermione. Admittedly, not all of them are pleasant things, but I am, at the very least, human."

"No. You are a monster," Hermione said, more to herself than to him. _Madman. Murderer._ The words coursed through her thoughts. Tom turned back to face her, but then his eyes went to the door, which opened to admit a very familiar wizard.

"Professor Slughorn, sir," said Tom in a slick voice, "How may I assist you today?"

**Author's Note: Whew! So, Dumbledore's not going to help Hermione get back to her time, but he does want to meet and get information to "prevent disaster." Hermione's teaching herself Occlumency. Tom is still being **_**suspiciously charming**_**, but obviously doesn't have a tight grip on all the Purebloods. And he also knows that Hermione's engaged to Ron. And, oh, what's this about Cygnus Black's birthday party? If you can't tell, the next few chapters are going to be action packed, so buckle up! Please do review.**


	5. Chapter 5

Hermione stirred her lamb stew with a spoon, noting its slightly bent handle. She could have used her wand to repair the spoon, but she was more than a little distracted. She set the spoon down and sipped at her peppermint tea. She had gone to the mysterious Knockturn Alley flat after work, and she'd encountered the old witch with the twin white braids again. The ancient witch, whose flat seemed to be next to Hermione's, was evidently deaf, but she also did not seem surprised by Hermione's presence in the building. Hermione chewed her lip as she wondered who the old neighbour was, as she wondered who owned the building where the flat was located.

She had thought, perhaps, that she would come back to the flat to find a letter from Albus Dumbledore arranging for the meeting he'd promised. Professor Horace Slughorn had come into Borgin and Burkes in search of poisonous snail shells for some potion he was making, and after he'd gone, Hermione had found herself wondering whether Slughorn had actually been sent by Dumbledore. That seemed like the sort of thing Dumbledore would do - to send one of his colleagues as a spy to feel out the time traveller with a nebulous backstory. In any case, Dumbledore had not written to Hermione. She had no new contact from him. He was keeping his distance.

Hermione remembered how, in her sixth year, when Dumbledore knew that he was enmeshed in a complicated system of Unbreakable Vows and Curses, a knot of Horcruxes and Hallows, he had kept himself at arm's length from Harry and his friends. Emotionally, Dumbledore had been downright cold that year. Now, Hermione knew that Dumbledore's behaviour during the Second Wizarding War had often been cautious and calculated because of risk, because of uncertainty. And Dumbledore was probably feeling that now, with Hermione arriving in 1947 out of nowhere. He wanted just enough information to keep Tom Riddle from becoming a destructive force, but he was also effectively powerless in sending Hermione back. And if he couldn't - or wouldn't - help Hermione, and he did not know whether he ought to truly trust her, then he would be distant. That was Dumbledore's way.

So Hermione was unsurprised, in a way, to receive radio silence from Dumbledore.

"You know, I am a bit surprised that you keep coming here to eat. The food is better at the Leaky Cauldron, and, in any case, the atmosphere there seems more your style."

Hermione raised her eyes to see Tom Riddle, who had apparently swept into the White Wyvern without her noticing. His dark waves were damp from the cold rain that was falling outside. Hermione huffed a breath and picked up her bent spoon. She silently took a bite of stew and lied,

"I like the food here."

Tom choked out a little laugh and slid into the bench opposite Hermione. She narrowed her eyes at him and said,

"I do not recall telling you you could sit with me."

"Celia," called Tom. Celia the serving witch glanced over, and Tom said, "I'll have lamb stew and a firewhisky, if you please."

Hermione pursed her lips and shook her head. She demanded of him, "What do you want?"

"I came to apologise," Tom said in a smooth voice. Hermione felt a spike of confusion, swallowing hard, but Tom continued, "I broke your rules."

Hermione was silent. _Rule Number One_, she'd said, and then she'd gone on to insist upon a lack of Legilimency. She fingered her engagement ring and asked,

"Why don't you just paw through all of my memories and eliminate me?"

"Because, Miss Granger, I do not think that is the wisest course of action at the moment." Tom sniffed as Celia brought him his stew and firewhisky. He nodded his thanks and passed over a few coins. He sipped at his firewhisky from its granite tumbler, and he winced a little at the burn. Hermione wondered what he meant. It wasn't the wisest course of action to leave her mind alone? What could he possibly be playing at, saying a thing like that?

"Your time travel appears accidental, Miss Granger, but I tend not to believe in coincidences," Tom said lightly. He dipped his crusty bread into his stew and chewed a bite, and Hermione took a moment to spoon some stew into her own mouth. She took a drink of tea and waited for him to carry on, "You have already shown me, however incidentally, that in your existence, I had many Horcruxes, all of which were destroyed by my enemies. I wound up in a demolished shell of a body, and I ultimately died a shameful death. All of that, to your great concern, after causing immense suffering. I confess that that bit troubles me the least."

"I'm sure it does." Hermione scowled at him, but he dipped his bread again and said,

"I think I know what I need to know… for the time being. I also think that _eliminating you_, as you say, would be exceedingly foolish. You are a fount of knowledge; your mind is a veritable encyclopaedia. And, yet, I think that knowing absolutely everything you do may cause a bit of paranoia to fester within me. There are ways, perhaps, to avoid such a cataclysm as you lived without me simply reading your thoughts and disposing of you."

"So…" Hermione stirred her stew. "You are going to keep me about in case you wish to know something? I shan't tell you."

"You will, if I decide I want to know," Tom informed her. Hermione puffed a breath and shook her head.

"No. I'm an Occlumens."

"You show the very first shadows of Occlumency study in your mind, but you are not a true Occlumens," Tom said, almost mockingly. When she met his eyes, he threw up an eyebrow and tutted, "Self-taught."

They ate in quiet for a moment, as Hermione spooned stew slowly into her mouth and glared at Tom Riddle. He was wicked and evil, she thought to herself. She knew that about him. She knew what Harry had seen in Dumbledore's memories of visiting Tom Riddle at Wool's Orphanage. Even as a young boy, Tom Marvolo Riddle had terrorised other children and had shown signs of being a manipulative, Dark creature.

Now she studied him as he sipped his stone tumbler of firewhisky, and she saw a disarmingly handsome wizard. It was easy to see why witches at Hogwarts, or others who encountered him here in Knockturn Alley, would be charmed on many levels. He had coal-black eyes that glittered in the light of the White Wyvern's lanterns. He had a long, straight nose that led down to shapely lips. His cheekbones were high, and his chin was classic. His dark, wavy hair was perfectly groomed with a side part. He stared right at Hermione, seeming aware all of a sudden of the way she was surveying him. He took another little sip of firewhisky and then set down the tumbler. He dipped his bread into his stew and dragged it around, glancing down at his food.

"You knew who Walburga Black was," he noted. "When I introduced her to you, you knew who she was. Did you know her?"

"I knew her son," Hermione said simply. She said nothing of Regulus Black, of the way Regulus had tricked Voldemort when it came to the locket Horcrux. She said nothing of Kreacher, or of the cave full of Inferi. She said nothing of Walburga's screaming portrait in Grimmauld Place. She knew the thoughts were going through her mind, and she tried her best to cover them up with an inky blackness. She tried not to grieve Sirius all over again. She tried not to feel the emotions that were attached to Grimmauld Place in her mind. She tried not to feel the insult of being called a _Mudblood_ by Walburga's shrieking portrait. But Tom Riddle could see it all, she knew. He could feel the pulse of her mind; he did not have to work nearly as hard to invade her head as she had to work to keep him out.

"You knew Cygnus Black?" Tom asked lightly, and Hermione quirked up half her mouth, shaking her head as she realised there was nothing she could do to stop this inquisition. Dumbledore would ask her all of this information and more. At least Dumbledore would use the facts for good, she thought.

"I knew Cygnus' daughters." Hermione glanced to her cup of tea and thought of Narcissa, the mother of Draco. She thought of Andromeda, the mother of Tonks. Hermione had never met Andromeda, but she knew of the disowned '_Blood Traitor._' Then she thought of Bellatrix. She thought of how Bellatrix had tortured the Longbottoms. She thought of how Bellatrix had broken out of Azkaban, how Bellatrix had carved the word _Mudblood_ into Hermione's flesh and had thrown the dagger that had murdered Dobby.

"Had enough?" Hermione asked quietly. She met Tom's eyes, and he blinked. He sniffed a little and shrugged.

"None of them matter, if the end result was me slumped in death in the hollow husk of a white corpse."

"Your own mortality is all that matters," Hermione noted thickly, and Tom scoffed a bit.

"I had many Horcruxes and appeared to seek eternity in every way I possibly could, Miss Granger. Yes, my mortality appears to have continued to play quite a role."

"You still died," Hermione snarled, "like a Beast who'd been put down."

"So I see," Tom nodded. "I should like to avoid that. Listen. You knew the offspring of Walburga Black, of Cygnus Black. I'm assuming that means other names bear significance to you, too. Mulciber, Nott, Avery, Lestrange, Rosier, Yaxley…"

Hermione raised her eyebrows. "Yes. I know those names well. What of it?"

"All of my old, erm… _friends._ They're going to be at Cygnus' birthday party this weekend." Tom Riddle spooned some stew into his mouth and sipped some more firewhisky. Hermione was about to ask why she should care who was going to be at the party, but then Tom said, "I should think you might find it interesting to see my old school friends in person. I could tell you were intrigued to see Walburga come walking into the shop."

"I was not _intrigued,_" Hermione said defensively. "I was surprised."

"In any case," Tom shrugged, "You don't know many people in this time, and you haven't got any way home. Don't you think it would at least be a good… oh, I don't know… a good expedition of sorts? Venturing into enemy territory and fraternising with the other side for one evening?"

Hermione meant to snap that that was a ridiculous idea. She wanted to insist that it was a completely ludicrous suggestion for her to actually socialise with Bellatrix Black's parents, or with a younger version of the eldest Death Eaters she would later face in combat. But then she realised she had a morbid curiosity. These were, indeed, the enemy, and she had the opportunity to witness what they had been like as young people. Whilst Walburga's appearance in Borgin and Burkes had been a cold shock to Bellatrix's system, she could not deny that it had been interesting to see Sirius' mother as a young woman. It was one thing to be screamed at by a portrait in Grimmauld Place. It was another to converse with a witch in elaborate robes. Hermione chomped her lip and shook her head.

"As if they'd let me anywhere near their stupid party. A Muggle-born? They'd probably claim they could smell me coming. And then they'd laugh and say they couldn't tell me apart from the House-Elf, and -"

"They will think of you whatever I tell them to think," Tom said smoothly, "if you walk in there with me."

Hermione rolled her eyes and snorted a derisive laugh. "Right. Let me just waltz on into a Pureblood party with Lord Voldemort. No problem. Not as though I'm engaged to a wizard who helped defeat you or anything."

"You are a witch of two worlds now, Miss Granger," Tom said delicately. "You left behind a life in the year 2000, and Ronald Weasley was intricately knotted into that existence. But he is not here, and you've no way back home for the time being. So why not go on a reconnaissance mission with your colleague?"

"Reconnaissance mission," Hermione repeated, disbelieving the fact that she was even considering his suggestion. He nodded, and she cocked an eyebrow. "Colleague."

"We do work together, you and I." Tom tipped his head. "The party is at seven o'clock on Saturday. Cygnus Black's townhouse in Kensington. Shall I meet you there, or would you care to be escorted?"

Hermione chewed her lip so hard she tasted blood, and she finally admitted, "I can't Apparate here. I'm not sure why not."

Tom looked fascinated. "I thought you fell in Madam Amaranth's because you were trying to time travel."

"I tried to go to Hogsmeade early this morning," Hermione said. "I… something's wrong. I'm very accomplished with Apparition, but I can't do it here."

"No matter; I shall take you by Side-Along," Tom said imperiously. "Your flat is in the building just beyond Markus Scarrs, isn't it?"

She wanted to ask him how he knew that, but she really wasn't interested in how he'd found that information out. So she just nodded, and he told her,

"I'll pick you up at five to seven, then. Dress nicely, Miss Granger; these are moneyed folk. I think you know well that I am familiar with the sensation of being aspirational among the Pureblood crowd, so I empathise with… well. What Mr Burke gave you won't get you very far."

He pulled out a drawstring bag from the inside of his cloak, and he opened it. Hermione watched in wonder as he took a blind fistful of gold Galleons out of the bag and held them out to Hermione. She froze, but he raised his eyebrows and repeated,

"Dress nicely."

* * *

Hermione stared down at herself and wondered if she looked all right. She had tried very hard to look… well, _magical._ Very often, at events like the Yule Ball or Slug Club parties or Bill and Fleur's wedding, she had dressed up but had let her Muggle heritage bleed into her fashion. For tonight's party, though, she had gone to Signor Alfredo's Continental Attire For All Needs, and she'd been fitted in a fine gown that seemed distinctly witchy.

It was mint green raw silk, with silver ribbon trim around the square collar and long sleeves. A rope of metallic silver belted the gown and hung long in the front. A cape of gauzy green silk cascaded from both shoulders and fell all the way to the ground. Hermione had carefully styled her hair in milkmaid braids criss-crossing her head, and she'd Conjured a solitary pearl on a silver chain to put around her neck. She had gone into the beauty shop that would eventually become Madam Primpernelle's, and she'd purchased an all-purpose beautification creme. It had smoothed her skin, lightly shadowed her eyes, sculpted her brows, and darkened her lips. Hermione swallowed hard and slid her feet into the flat black shoes she'd bought, and she wondered just what she was doing.

What would Ron and Harry think of this? Hermione could just see Ron's face going purple with rage at the idea of Hermione accompanying Tom Marvolo Riddle to a Pureblood party. She could just see him using his wand to smash windows, could hear Harry shouting about _what they'd done and why_. She could just feel Ginny Weasley's simmering hatred at the very notion of all this. She could sense Molly's profound disappointment?

What would Dumbledore think?

Hermione shut her eyes. This was a reconnaissance mission. She was going to this party to see what her enemy had been like as young people. She was going to see what Tom Riddle was like interacting with his cronies. She was going because…

Because she was trapped here, and because she needed to feel productive, and because someday she'd go home with a mind full of useful information. Or something like that.

There was knocking on the door of the flat, and Hermione let out a shaking breath as she grabbed her wand and shoved it into the looped holster built into the waist of the gown. She walked toward the door, and when she opened it, her mouth fell open a little. Tom Riddle was before her, wearing a crisp black bow tie and a neatly tailored suit. He blinked down at Hermione and looked a little surprised.

"Am I dressed nicely enough?" Hermione demanded. Tom just nodded. He took a step forward and suggested,

"We'll Disapparate from the inside of your flat."

"Oh. Erm… don't judge its appearance; I had nothing to do with it." Hermione let him in and shut the door behind him. Tom looked around, seeming very curious. He narrowed his eyes and dragged his fingers over the kitchen counter. He turned to Hermione and asked,

"You just… woke up here?"

"Yes." Hermione gulped. "I fell asleep at home in my own time. With Ron. I woke up alone, in a strange place. I came to Madam Amaranth's, and that's where I figured out what had happened."

"How very strange." Tom's voice was quiet. He stepped toward Hermione and studied her. "You look wealthy."

"I think Walburga Black could tell very evidently that I am not wealthy," Hermione scoffed. "She knows I'm Muggle-born, as well, so…"

"Well, I find you fascinating, and thus so shall they." Tom was so supremely confident that Hermione almost laughed, but she thought that it probably wasn't very intelligent to mock Tom Riddle. She just sighed and said,

"Shall we go, then?"

"Yes." Tom held out his arm and smirked a little. Hermione let out a quivering breath, threaded her hand under his elbow, and winced at the feel of actually touching him. She sidled up against him, looked up at him, and locked gazes with him for a moment as he promised her,

"Tonight will be very interesting. Don't worry about that much."

"Well, all right, then," Hermione nodded. Tom licked his lip and curled up his lips, and then without another word, he Disapparated, taking Hermione with him.

**Author's Note: Who's ready for Cygnus' birthday party? Get hype! Thanks so much for reading and please do review!**


	6. Chapter 6

"Is Cygnus Black married yet?" Hermione hissed as she and Tom Riddle walked up the steps of the elegant white townhouse before her. He shook his head and said simply,

"Engaged. He and Druella Rosier are getting married this summer. So are a lot of people; these past few years since the war have seen a flush of marriages."

"That's how it was in the Muggle world, too," Hermione noted, though she knew Tom didn't care about that. She let Tom walk right up to the door and slam the knocker a few times, and her heart accelerated in her chest. He glanced her up and down, and she shivered where she stood as she realised she hadn't worn a formal winter cloak. Tom opened his mouth as though he meant to say something, but then the shiny black door swung open, and a shaky little House-Elf gestured for Tom and Hermione to enter the townhouse.

"Please do come in," said the elf. Two cats, a small orange one and a heftier smooth white one, meandered behind the House-Elf. Hermione followed Tom into the townhouse and heard laughter and conversation, as well as the sound of a phonograph playing maudlin music. Tom held out his arm, and Hermione scowled up at him. She shook her head a little, unwilling to walk into the party _on his arm._ But he flashed her a look that bore warning, and he murmured,

"I think it would be wise if you went in there with me, Miss Granger."

"Do you?" she snapped, but she laced her fingers up through his sleeve and held onto his arm again. Suddenly she realised something, and she froze in the foyer. She gulped and yanked her arm away from Tom's, and he looked confused. Hermione's lips parted as her eyes went to her left hand and settled on her engagement ring. Nobody here knew about Ron Weasley. Nobody here knew that she was engaged to a war hero who had helped defeat Lord Voldemort. All they would see was that she was walking into the party with Tom Riddle wearing an engagement ring, and they would assume that she was engaged to _him_. She reached to pull off her ring, and she stared at it for a long moment.

"Here," Tom said quietly. "I'll give it back later."

She eyed him warily. Ron had saved up for months to buy her this diamond. Her eyes welled as she remembered the day he'd gone down on one knee to give it to her and beg her to marry him. The gold felt cold in her fingers now as she felt farther from home than ever. Tom Riddle reached for Hermione's engagement ring and carefully took it, tucking it into his trouser pocket as he nodded and repeated,

"I'll give it back later."

"If you don't, I'll Hex you blind and bald," Hermione threatened, and he smirked a little.

"All right. Let's go." He held out his arm again, and Hermione finally put her hand back through his crooked elbow. He led her down the corridor and to the left, into a large parlour where about fifteen or twenty people were gathered. Witches and wizards were lounging on furniture, standing in little clumps, sipping on drinks and chatting. Hermione actually recognised some features, even with fifty-three years between this time and her own. Abraxas Malfoy's son, whom Hermione had faced, looked much like the father who was in this room. The Rosier boy here had the same heavy hooded eyes as his niece, Bellatrix Lestrange.

"Tom!"

A pudgy young man with inky black hair and a round face emerged from the group. He appeared to be trying to grow a mustache, though it was thin and awkward-looking. In his face, Hermione saw Draco Malfoy's nose, and she made the family connection through Narcissa. This was Cygnus. This was the birthday boy.

"Happy birthday, Cygnus," Tom Riddle confirmed smoothly. Cygnus Black walked toward Tom, holding the hand of a tall, thin blonde witch clad in a gorgeous maroon set of robes. Tom nodded. "Druella."

"This must be the girl from Borgin and Burkes," said Druella Rosier in a nasally voice. "Walburga told us about you. I wasn't expecting Tom to bring you."

"Thank you for having me," Hermione said, trying to control the tremble in her voice. "Happy birthday, Mr Black."

"Hmm." Cygnus Black tipped his head. "What was your name again?"

"This is Miss Hermione Granger," said Tom. Hermione realised her hand was still laced through his arm; it looked like they were here _together. _She almost physically recoiled from him, but he told Cygnus and Druella, "Miss Granger was, well, left on her own by the last conflicts, both the Muggle and the magical. She had to make her own way, and through ingenious self-instruction, she became a skilled witch in an unforgiving world. I'm terribly impressed with her."

"Are you?" Cygnus sounded impressed now.

"And you work… in the shop?" Druella Rosier did not sound so very impressed. Hermione pinched her lips and said,

"I do. Just like Mr Riddle."

She watched half of his mouth quirk up beside her, and then he reached into his suit jacket and pulled out a small box. Suddenly Hermione realised with a streak of panic that she'd come to a birthday party - even an enemy's birthday party - without a gift. But Tom said meaningfully,

"Happy birthday, Cygnus, from all of us at Borgin and Burkes."

Hermione's mouth fell open a bit, but she stayed quiet as she watched Cygnus happily unwrap the box. Druella Rosier marveled as Cygnus pulled out a brass pocket watch. He studied the back of the pocket watch and said to Druella,

"Oh, it's monogrammed. _CBIII_, my initials. How very kind, Tom."

Hermione had a sneaking suspicion that Tom Riddle had done the intricate monogramming work himself, for she knew he wasn't exactly rich working at Borgin and Burkes. There was no way he could go into Bijoux Fineries on Diagon Alley and commission an expensive watch for his 'friend.' But he was more than capable of the spellwork required to make such a gift himself. Hermione slid her hand a little, feeling again like she should not be holding onto the young man who would become Lord Voldemort. Her arm separated from his, and he frowned a bit at her before clearing his throat and saying lightly,

"You're a distinguished Ministry official now, Cygnus; you need to be on time, eh? Where's the wine?"

"Just over there." Druella gestured behind her with a vague motion, toward a table where there were glasses and bottles of expensive-looking Elf-made wine. There was another table with a three-layered birthday cake, and a tray of cheese with strawberries. Hermione's stomach grumbled a bit, and she thought to herself that she might like a little snack.

_I ought not be eating their food, _she scolded herself internally. What would Ron and Harry think of her, standing here in the green silk gown she'd bought with Tom Riddle's money, craving strawberries served at a party full of Pureblood snobs? She huffed a breath as Tom murmured from beside her,

"I want some strawberries."

She flushed hot in her cheeks. She knew he was only saying that because he'd crept into her mind. She glared up at him and thrust forth a thought as clearly as she could, so plainly that there was no way he could possibly miss it, even if he weren't trying to read the pulse of her thoughts.

_Rule Number One, Mr Riddle. No Legilimency whatsoever._

"Miss Granger, do you prefer white wine or red?" Tom asked immediately, and Hermione narrowed her eyes at him. She gulped and hissed,

"Red. Please."

"Of course. Excuse me, Cygnus. Druella." He bowed his head and walked away, leaving Hermione alone with Druella and Cygnus. Druella looked like she had a thousand questions, but before she could say anything, another witch sidled up alongside her. This young woman was visibly pregnant, so she was wisely holding a glass of water in one hand and a chunk of cheese in the other. Her velvet-trimmed gown robes fell over her swollen belly as she waddled up and said,

"How do you do. I don't believe we've met."

"This is Miss Hermione Granger," said Druella Rosier rather coldly. "She's… she works in Borgin and Burkes with Mr Riddle. Her magic is self-taught."

The other witch seemed to get the gist of what Druella was hinting at. _Mudblood._ Hermione could practically hear the epithet hissing through the air, crackling along with the phonograph. The pregnant witch pursed her lips and then sipped her water before saying in a tight voice,

"How do you do, Miss Granger? I'm Odessa Lestrange. That's my husband, Reynard, over there." She pointed to where three young wizards stood eyeing Hermione with curious gazes. Obelia continued, "We've a sixteen-month-old at home, a boy called Rabastan, and I'm expecting our second child in the spring. The Healer at St Mungo's says this one's a girl."

Hermione did not know whether or not that was true. She knew that Rabastan and Rodolphus Lestrange were brothers, that they had fought together and had refused to renounce Voldemort even after his disappearance. They'd gone to Azkaban, and though Rodolphus' wife Bellatrix had been killed in the Battle of Hogwarts, the brothers had survived and had been in prison again when Hermione had fallen asleep in the year 2000. But she knew nothing of their birth years. Perhaps this witch, Odessa, was pregnant with some sister who had come in between the boys. Or perhaps she would surprise herself and birth Rodolphus. Or perhaps Rodolphus had been Un-Born by Hermione's time travel, and everything was already being made to go sideways as a consequence of Hermione moving through the years.

"Erm." Hermione nodded. "Congratulations."

"Odessa, you simply must stop being such a model for us all," complained Druella Rosier. "My mother simply won't let me hear the end of it. _Look at Odessa and Reynard. Married straight away out of school, second child on the way…_"

Hermione felt bile rise in her throat, and she tried not to roll her eyes as Tom Riddle came walking back toward her. She was surprised to see that he'd Conjured a platter and had placed two small plates of food and two wine glasses on the platter. He held it out and gave Hermione a look that she could have only described as flirtatious, his dark eyes glittering as he hummed,

"I wanted strawberries."

Hermione puffed out a breath and nodded her thanks as she took a plate of cheese, crackers, and strawberries, along with a glass of red wine. Tom held the tray in one hand then and seemed to be performing a party trick as he wandlessly Vanished the tray into Nonbeing, Levitated his wine and food, and deftly plucked the dishes out of the air. Druella and Odessa gasped softly, and Cygnus Black declared,

"And _this_ is why everyone knows you'll do great things, Mr Riddle. Parlour tricks without a wand may seem like child's play, but I think we all know what they really hint at."

"I'm glad we all know, Cygnus," Tom said smoothly. He sipped his wine and commanded, "Send Nott and Avery over, will you?"

"Of course. Thank you for the watch." Cygnus Black bowed his head, almost reverently, and backed away with Druella's hand clutched in his. Odessa Lestrange turned and quickly waddled off, seeming a bit afraid of Tom Riddle. Hermione stared up at him as the two of them made their way to a high standing table and set down their food and drinks.

"You like to show off," she said accusingly. He shrugged and replied,

"I like to show what I can do. It's been a while since school; some of my old friends could use a reminder about… well, they're used to _this_, and I'm working in a shop. Things were different at school."

"You were the leader of a gang at school. Don't worry; I know the story." Hermione picked up a strawberry and pursed her lips. She stared at Tom and watched as he ate a berry, watched his thumb drag over his bottom lip to draw away the juice. She shivered and set her own strawberry down as two wizards came walking up.

"All right, Tom?" asked one, a scrawny young man with dishwater blond hair. The other wizard was his polar opposite, downright fat with brown curls.

"Nott. Avery. I thought I'd see you in Borgin and Burkes for Christmas shopping."

"Oh. I, erm… I'll come in soon," promised the blond wizard. He turned to Hermione and said, "Hello, there. Can't say as we've met."

"I'd like you to meet Miss Hermione Granger," said Tom, "my colleague at Borgin and Burkes. She is a particularly skilled witch who managed to educate herself to the highest degree of magic despite rather unfavourable circumstances."

"Owing to the wars," Hermione said, flashing Tom a weighty look. He took a breath and smiled a little, gesturing to the wizards. First he aimed his hand at the blond one and said,

"Mr Avery works at the Ministry of Magic, in the Floo Network Authority. And this is Mr Nott. He works… what _do _you do these days, Nott?"

Tom laughed a little, and the wizard with the dark brown curls scratched at his head and said,

"I'm my father's assistant, so to speak. He's a historian and genealogist. I'm still living and working at Nott Castle."

"Quite." Tom sipped his red wine and said, "Well, I just had to bring Miss Granger to meet all of my old friends. I'm sure I quite bore her to tears in the shop with tales of our old escapades."

"Ha…" Avery looked a little nervous, and glanced between Tom and Hermione and seemed to be trying to assess whether or not they were actually _together._ Hermione decided to clarify that matter once and for all.

"I didn't think it was at all appropriate to attend a birthday party with a colleague," she sniffed, "but Mr Riddle insisted it would be beneficial for me to meet some of the people who I might encounter most frequently working at Borgin and Burkes."

She could tell at once that that answer hadn't quite made anybody happy. She'd managed to confuse both Nott and Avery, it seemed, and Tom Riddle just looked cross. He dragged the pad of his finger around the rim of his wine glass and said,

"Nott, go tell Cygnus it's time for him to blow out his candles. I want cake."

"Oh. All right." Nott, the curly-haired wizard, nodded to Hermione and turned to scurry away, leaving Avery alone with Tom and Hermione. Avery cleared his throat and appeared to be trying again as he asked,

"Do you and your husband live here in London?"

"It's _Miss_ Granger, Avery," Tom snapped. "She isn't married."

_I'm engaged!_ Hermione wanted to exclaim. Suddenly her eyes welled very heavily, and she found herself saying numbly,

"I had someone. I had… erm… the most wonderful wizard in the whole world, but he… I… lost him."

She shut her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them, Avery was giving her a pained expression. He seemed to realise he'd said entirely the wrong thing.

"Owing to the wars?" he mumbled, and Hermione just nodded.

"Gather round!" called a voice, mercifully breaking up the horrid discussion. Hermione snapped to attention and saw that Druella Rosier was using her wand to light twenty-one little candles on the top tier of Cygnus' chocolate cake. Someone shut off the phonograph, and everybody milling about began to draw near to the cake. Hermione watched as Cygnus stood near the cake, listened as everyone began to sing to him, and she felt the room spin a little.

She didn't belong here, she thought. She did not belong in this parlour, at this wretched party full of Pureblood extremists. She did not belong near Tom Riddle. She did not belong in the year 1947, thirty-two years before her birth. Suddenly a thought raced through her mind, and she found herself gripping at Tom's arm tightly. She wasn't really sure what made her grasp at his sleeve, except that she needed his attention and people were busy singing to Cygnus. She raised her gaze and made eye contact with him, silently willing him to enter her mind. She felt a little slip, a silent invasion of Legilimency, and she considered the notion that had just coursed through her thoughts.

_I can't Apparate because I do not belong here. I am not of this time, and so coordinating time and space correctly is not something I can do in 1947. I've lost my ability to intersect time and space neatly enough to move through them on my own._

Tom let out a long breath and clapped his hands as Cygnus blew out his candles.

"I had the same thought," he said quietly over the din of applause. "It's the only explanation that makes sense, outside of a Curse. In any case, you will be needing assistance to move about for the time being."

"Assistance or a broom," Hermione muttered, thinking of just how much she hated flying. She released Tom's arm, upset at herself for having grabbed him. She took a half step away from him as the cake was quickly cut and divvied onto plates by the House-Elf. Plates of cake were carefully brought about on Levitated trays, and everyone took a plate and a fork and began eating. Hermione chewed and swallowed a bite of chocolate cake as she looked around the room. Walburga Black was standing with Orion and her brother Cygnus, admiring the watch that Tom had gifted his old 'friend.' Nott and Avery were standing near the fireplace, gobbling down cake. Odessa Lestrange appeared to be dragging her husband away from conversation, insisting that they needed to get home to Rabastan. Druella and a girl who looked suspiciously like her sister were standing with Abraxas Malfoy and a very tall wizard who must have been Mulciber or one of Tom's other old cronies.

This was all profoundly strange, Hermione thought. Standing here in her expensive robes paid for by _him_, by the one who would become Voldemort, eating cake and socialising with younger iterations of the villains she would know… suddenly it was all too much. She dashed over to the tall table where she and Tom had put their wine and cheese and strawberries. She set down her cake and picked up her wine, swigging at it until the entire glass was empty. She slammed down the glass and walked briskly toward the door that led from the parlour to the corridor, and when she reached the foyer of the townhouse, she heard steps creaking on the floorboards behind her.

"Are you going to walk back to Knockturn Alley?" asked Tom Riddle?

"I shall take a Muggle cab," Hermione insisted.

"In that gown? With what money?"

Hermione whirled on him and tore her wand out of its holster. "I'll Confound the driver."

He looked awfully surprised then, raising his brows and licking his lips. "That seems… uncharacteristic of you."

"You think you know _anything _about me?" Hermione demanded shrilly. "Just what do you know about me, Tom Riddle?"

He leaned against the damask wallpaper and said in a calm voice,

"You were born on the nineteenth of September, 1979 to dentist parents. The Sorting Hat deliberated for a while on whether to put you into Ravenclaw or Gryffindor; it ultimately decided on the latter. Your wand is vine wood with a dragon heartstring core, and you adore it. You, Ron Weasley, and Harry Potter became friends after an incident with a Mountain Troll in a bathroom in your first year. You despised Divination and dropped the class even when you had a Time Turner available to overload your schedule. You received Howlers in the Great Hall after a reporter claimed you'd broken the hearts of two famous young wizards. You Obliviated your parents to protect them… from me… and after all was said and done, you went to Australia to find them."

Hermione blinked, her eyes welling up and boiling over with tears. She shook her head and insisted, "You said you weren't going to look for everything."

Tom sighed and shook his head. "You thought about all of that whilst Scouring the shop and packaging up purchases in the shop; I didn't have to look."

"Rule Number One, Tom Riddle," Hermione growled. "No Legilimency."

He stood up straight from the wall and nodded. "I am not very good at following rules, and from what I gather, neither are you. But I shall follow your rules. Both of them - no Legilimency and no attacking you - because I think that is the wisest course of action. But do not claim, Hermione Jean Granger, that you and I do not already know one another very well indeed. I think we do."

She wrenched her eyes shut and jabbed her wand back into its holster. "I hate this party. I want to leave this stupid party. I'm walking back to Knockturn Alley."

"I'll take you by Side-Along," Tom said calmly.

"No," Hermione snarled. "You are not Apparating into my flat with me right now. No."

He tipped his head and reached into his trouser pocket. He pulled out a silver Sickle and then extracted his wand. He touched the tip of his wand to the coin and began murmuring spells at it, and Hermione watched as it was Transfigured into a one-pound Muggle coin. He handed it over to her, and she stared at it.

"For the cab," Tom said simply. "I've put a Charm on it so the Transfiguration sticks for a good long while. You needn't be consumed with guilt over the matter."

"Thanks," Hermione mumbled.

"And this," Tom said, reaching into his pocket again. He held out Hermione's engagement ring, the one Ron Weasley had put on her finger in 1999. Tom pressed it into Hermione's palm, and she nodded. She put on her engagement ring and said,

"Goodnight. See you at work tomorrow."

"Monday," Tom corrected her. "We're both off tomorrow. You've got the day to yourself to do nothing but relax… perhaps you can spend your time trying to figure a way back home, or perhaps Professor Dumbledore will show up on your doorstep. In any case."

He sniffed a little and cast his eyes up and down her form. His throat bobbed a little, and he told her,

"They did find you interesting."

Hermione shut her eyes and choked out a little laugh.

"Goodnight, Tom."

"Goodnight, Miss Granger." When she opened her eyes again, he was staring right at her with his hands in his pockets. Suddenly all she could think was that he was terribly handsome. His dark eyes glinted in the light from the wall sconces. Someone laughed loudly from the parlour behind him, but he just blinked at Hermione, and eventually she had to tear herself away. She turned, opening the front door of the townhouse. She descended the front steps of the house and stood at the edge of the road. She realised just what a quiet street she was on, and the thought suddenly crossed her mind that London was only two years out of World War II. She knew from studying history that the London Black Cab had not really blossomed into being for several more years. Hermione stared up and down the road, watching a puttering old automobile from the 1920s amble unassumingly by.

"You may either come back into the party, or I will be glad to escort you home," said a voice. Hermione turned round to see Tom standing just outside the shiny black townhouse door. He smirked down at her and shook his head. "You'll not be getting a ride back in a car, I don't suppose."

He walked down the steps towards her, and Hermione pinched her lips as she hesitantly held her arm out. Tom reached for her hand and immediately Disapparated, and Hermione was peeled through the whirling black void. When she came to, she had landed in the mysterious flat where she'd awakened. She looked around, realising there were no real decorations here. There were no photo frames, no pieces of artwork. There were books, and there was sparse furniture, and there was a Wizarding Wireless on a shelf. But that was it.

"I wonder why that works," Tom mused, and Hermione turned toward him. He shrugged. "Why can I take you to a destination in space here, but you can't go on your own? It's odd. You're a powerful witch, I think. It seems strange that this particular action is confined."

"I'll be certain to report it to Professor Dumbledore when I speak with him," Hermione said primly.

"Does he seem very eager to speak with you?" Tom narrowed his eyes. "It's been days since you wrote to him. How many letters have you two exchanged?"

Hermione's cheeks went hot. She shook her head and hissed, "That's none of your -"

"It is indeed my business," Tom corrected her, "whether or not you're meeting with Albus Dumbledore to discuss me."

He looked very dangerous, all of a sudden. The charming young man who had been almost kind to Hermione, disarmingly good-natured over the last week, was gone. He had given way to a black-eyed man with a squared jaw who said through clenched teeth,

"What I will not allow is for that man to interfere in ways that destroy me."

Hermione tossed up her hands, prepared to begin a rant about just how badly Lord Voldemort needed destroying. But then she noticed something, and she stared at her left hand. Her engagement ring was gone from her left finger. She touched at the bare spot where her ring had been and gasped. She angrily raised her eyes to Tom and demanded,

"What did you do with it?"

"With what?" He looked confused.

"My ring!" she exclaimed shrilly. "My engagement ring from Ron! I put it on at the townhouse, and now it's gone."

Tom walked over to Hermione and seized her hand, studying her finger as though it were a specimen. He frowned deeply and jabbed his hands into his pockets. He shook his head, and he mumbled,

"It must've Vanished, or… travelled. It must have been taken somehow, when we Apparated."

"You think my engagement ring disappeared off my finger when we Apparated?" Hermione asked disbelievingly. "Well, get it back! I need it back!"

"What am _I _meant to do to get your bloody ring back?" Tom snapped. "I didn't do anything to it."

Hermione began to shake where she stood. She shook her head and held onto her left hand with her right one. "Oh, Ron. Oh, I'm so sorry. Ron, Ron… oh, where have you gone from me?"

Tom let her pace and sob for a moment, but then she aimed a finger at the door and insisted,

"I want you to leave. Now."

Tom Riddle, for once, did not argue. He just walked away, opening and shutting the door without another word and leaving Hermione alone. She sank onto the threadbare sofa in her ridiculously extravagant gown, staring at her empty hand where Ron's ring had been, feeling tears course over her cheeks, wondering if she would ever know home again.

**Author's Note: Oh, dear. So, Hermione held her own at the party. And we're starting to get some idea of why she can't Apparate, or at least starting to get some idea of what kind of magic is affecting her. And she and Tom arel… flirting? Ish? Kinda? Maybe? But then Ron's ring vanishes and spoils it all. Of course. **

**Thanks for reading. Please do review.**


	7. Chapter 7

Hermione scanned the bookshelf in the small sitting room of the Knockturn Alley flat, wondering if any of the tomes were key to discovering why she'd awakened here. She dusted her fingertips over the spines of the books and narrowed her eyes as she made out the titles. _Frozen Magic: Wizardry in the Polar Regions. Tree Leaves and Their Many Uses in Potion-Making. A History of Magical Photography. Thewlina Nawlis in Her Own Words._

Hermione realised that, while interesting, none of these books were going to help her get back home. She frowned, looking at a section of tawdry romance novels, and then she heard a rapping on the window in the flat's bedroom. She walked quickly through the sitting room, her bare feet padding on the floor. She saw the owl on the other side of the window, and her heart thunked as she reached to open the window. The owl came hopping inside, and Hermione could see that there was a scroll tied to its foot, bound with red ribbon. Hermione pulled the scroll off and untied the ribbon, leaving the window open as it was much warmer today than the days that had come before. She unfurled the scroll and read,

_Dear Miss Granger,_

_After extensive consultation with my most trusted friends and colleagues, I have determined that, at this time, a meeting is not wise. Rather, I believe it is best to proceed with the knowledge you have given me thus far, which seems to be sufficient to confirm the worst of my concerns, but is not hopefully not enough to cause Un-Births and other catastrophic ripple effects. _

_Time travel through many decades is indeed a dangerous operation, however accidental, and no one ought meddle in the matter any more extensively than is absolutely necessary._

_Do write to me should you find yourself in need of any specific assistance. If there is distinctive information I feel it is necessary for you to share, I will consult with you. Until then, be safe and well._

_Yours very sincerely,_

_Albus Dumbledore_

Hermione's mouth fell open. She thought at once that Dumbledore and Tom Riddle had essentially told her the same thing. Both of them wanted to keep Hermione around in case they wanted specific information. Both of them felt it was unwise to know everything, but both wanted unlimited access to her memories. Both of them wanted to use her to their ends - Tom for his aspirations, and Dumbledore to destroy Tom. But neither of them truly wanted to help Hermione. Albus Dumbledore, at least this Albus Dumbledore, was not interested in assisting Hermione to find her way back to Ron and Harry. All he wanted was a source of information in case he needed it. In the meantime, he did not trust her enough for an in-person meeting.

Suddenly Hermione found herself idolising Albus Dumbledore just a little bit less than she'd always done. Just a bit of the glitter seemed to have come off of him, knowing that this was the way he would treat a lost time traveller with knowledge about Voldemort.

She let the owl fly back out through the window and shut the pane, locking it. She crumpled up the letter and blinked through the burn of tears as she aimed her wand at the correspondence, Vanishing it. That reminded her of the way her engagement ring had mysteriously disappeared the night before through Apparition. It made Hermione wonder if Side-Along Apparition was truly safe. If her engagement ring would Vanish, what else would go? Her wand? Half of her body? She couldn't Apparate at all on her own here, and it did not seem at all evident that Apparition with help was actually safe.

Her magic was crippled here, Hermione thought. The act of traveling through time had done something to crack something inside of her magical core, as if someone had broken a wand. She was alone, and she had no one helping her get home, and she had far less of her magical ability here. What she did have was a paying job and one person - the wizard who would grow to become her deepest enemy - who at least understood what was going on.

Right on cue, there was knocking on Hermione's flat door. She jolted and padded across the bedroom and through the sitting room, knowing it must be him. It was only ten in the morning, but she knew why he'd be here. Her ring had Vanished through Apparition the night before. He was coming to make sure Hermione was still in this time, that she hadn't traveled through time herself. Hermione herself had awakened in the Knockturn Alley flat this morning with a sense of dread, for she'd rather hoped that the ring disappearing would have been the first sign of her going home. Perhaps, she'd thought, she would awaken in her rosy bedroom in the year 2000. Now she opened the flat's door, standing before Tom in a crisp blouse and pleated black skirt, and she sighed.

"Hello," she said. He looked almost relieved to see her, and he nodded.

"Have you got tea?" He asked, inviting himself inside. Hermione swallowed hard and opened her door, admitting him. He followed her into the flat, and when she went into the kitchen, she opened a cupboard and pulled down a tin of tea bags and declared,

"I haven't got any idea how old these are."

Tom stepped up beside her and took the tin. He sniffed at it and shrugged, but then he aimed his wand at the tin and incanted, "_Fresca._"

Hermione filled a teapot with hot water and set it to boiling, and she plopped a tea bag in two cups she pulled from the cupboard and Scoured clean of dust. She poured the hot water into the cups and began searching around for sugar.

"I don't need it," Tom drawled. Hermione nodded and carried her teacup over to the tiny kitchen table. Tom sat opposite her and said carefully,

"I went back to Cygnus' party after I brought you here last night."

"I'm sure they were all very amused that the _Mudblood_ had to leave early," Hermione snarled.

"As I said, they found you interesting," Tom declared, "so they were sorry to see you go."

"I genuinely do not care about what your friends think of me, Tom," Hermione said. She brushed her thumb over her fourth left finger, and Tom watched her do it. He opened his mouth as if he meant to say something, then appeared to think better of it. He shut his mouth, sipped at his hot tea, and set down his cup.

"I didn't stay too much longer myself. People started to get drunk, and then they felt compelled to dance, so."

Hermione actually smirked a little, imagining stuck-up Walburga Black locked in a dancing stance with stodgy Orion. She shook her head and asked,

"Who'd you dance with, then?"

He tipped his head and said, "Druella Rosier, since she the hostess. Her younger sister Priscilla."

Hermione remembered the beautiful blonde witch with the gleaming blue eyes who had been standing beside Druella. Had that been Priscilla Rosier? Hermione shook her head.

"I never knew of her. Maybe she died."

"She wants to go live in France, with her relatives," Tom said lightly. "She convinced her parents to send her to Beauxbatons instead of Hogwarts. My guess is that Priscilla was in Paris by the time you were born."

"I wonder why she wasn't with you," Hermione frowned. When Tom looked confused, Hermione taunted him, "You never married anybody."

"Good." Tom nodded. He sipped his tea again and sighed. "Witches are a terrible distraction. I learnt as much at Hogwarts. Had them hanging off of me."

"I'm sure you did." Hermione rolled her eyes, but Tom continued,

"I had more important things to do than snog girls in deserted corridors."

"Things like opening the Chamber of Secrets," Hermione nodded. Tom's face was still as he sipped some more tea, and Hermione barreled on, "Things like getting Hagrid expelled for something he didn't do. Things like murdering Myrtle Warren, and then your own relatives. Things like -"

"That's enough. Thank you." Tom set his teacup down and folded his hands. "I permit you to speak of my past because it is part of a timeline you have experienced. But I will not be mocked by you. I warn you that it is not advisable to ridicule me."

"I wasn't ridiculing you," Hermione scoffed. She pushed her own teacup forward and hissed, "I hate you."

"Hmm." Tom dragged his teeth over his bottom lip. "Well, fool that I am, I spent an hour last night telling everyone who would listen how Borgin and Burkes had acquired quite a brilliant young witch."

"Don't you hate me right back?" Hermione demanded. "I helped destroy you."

"I'm sure I would have done the same thing," Tom said, raising his eyebrows, "if I'd been in your shoes."

"My shoes would never fit you, Tom Riddle," Hermione whispered, and he nodded.

"D'you mind turning on the Wireless?" he asked suddenly, and Hermione frowned. She shrugged, and he said, "Nott and Avery kept droning on about going to a Quidditch match today, but they kept saying there was going to be a brawl before it, and… well, I like to keep apprised of the news before the _Prophet_ releases it if I can."

Hermione aimed her wand at the Wizarding Wireless, muttering a spell to switch it on. A blast of static blared through the flat, and Tom used his own wand to tune the device. Finally, a tinny voice rang out.

"_... and we will have full coverage of that match between the Wimbourne Wasps and Puddlemere United beginning in an hour's time. Until then, please enjoy the latest suite of orchestral music from the gifted witch we interviewed last week, Glasgow composer Catherine MacLeod._"

There was a beat of silence, and then lovely instrumental music began to play. Hermione swigged at her tea and set the cup down.

"It would seem," she said, "as though nothing of note is happening at the match."

"They'll cut into the music if a brawl happens," Tom pointed out. He drummed his fingers on the table and pursed his lips.

"Can't you listen to this in your own flat?" Hermione asked crossly. Tom gave her a look and flicked his eyebrows up.

"Of course. Sorry to bother you on your Sunday off, Miss Granger." He rose from his chair and began to clean up his tea, Siphoning and Scouring and Banishing the dishes. He walked out of the kitchen into the sitting room and glanced toward the books on the shelves.

"I've already looked over them," Hermione said. "It's just novels, memoirs, and some instructional texts that I'll probably read for the sake of reading them… but nothing to do with time travel."

"Your next-door neighbour," Tom said quietly, "the one with the white braids?"

"She's deaf, I think," Hermione nodded. Tom gave her a weighty look and said,

"She's the mother of the Medium who works in the shop two doors down from Borgin and Burkes. I went in there this morning and paid for the Madam Mutatia's time. She said that's her mother, that she used to have visions but that she hasn't spoken or really communicated with anybody in years. This building is owned by a Mr Caecus. Unfortunately, the Medium has no contact information for Mr Caecus, and as far as she knows, he doesn't collect rent from 'tenants.'"

Hermione's lips parted. "Why did you… why have you found all of this out?"

"Because, Miss Granger," Tom said lightly, "you want to go home."

"But you want me here as a _fount of knowledge,_" she quoted him. He blinked and shrugged.

"Your ring," he said. "You had a life. You left behind a life, so I thought perhaps I could at least try and find out what this place was."

Hermione felt something odd toward him then. Her searing sense of hate crackled just a little bit. She couldn't despise him as much as she wanted to, as much as she needed to.

"I don't think you should Apparate," he said, "even by Side-Along."

"I thought the same thing," Hermione murmured. She raised her eyes to Tom Riddle and studied his face - his long, straight nose and his glinting dark eyes, his full lips and his high cheekbones. He hadn't had time to snog girls in deserted classrooms. He'd danced with pretty Priscilla Rosier.

_Or perhaps I shall recruit you, _he'd said, and her head pounded with resistance against how handsome he was. She tried to think of Ron, to fill her nostrils with the smell of his ginger hair. She tried to think of kissing him, to think of his fingers laced through hers.

She listened to the music playing on the Wireless and blinked where she stood.

"Miss Granger?"

She just nodded, and Tom held out his left hand.

"Do you dance? In your time, is that… do people still dance?"

Hermione thought of the Yule Ball, where she'd danced with Viktor Krum and had made Ron very jealous. She thought of Bill and Fleur's wedding, which had been broken up by Death Eaters. She thought of parties where Ron had been sloshed through with firewhisky and had swayed with her. She nodded at Tom and said,

"Yes. We… we danced."

He curled up half his mouth and tipped his head. "I danced with the Rosier girls and a few others last night because you'd left, but I confess I was rather aggrieved you weren't there. You did, after all, look terribly pretty in that green dress."

"Tom." Hermione looked away, her cheeks flushing hot. The flush worked its way down her neck, and she shook her head a little. But Tom stepped up to her and reached to take her right hand in his. He raised their hands up beside them, and he reached around Hermione, dusting his fingertips over her back carefully. He seemed hesitant to touch her, and she tensed at the contact. But some instinct told her to reach up and curl her hand over his shoulder, so she did. She and Tom began to wobble, not settling into the rhythm of the music for a solid eight beats or so. Once they were swaying more reliably, Tom began to guide Hermione, rocking with her to the two-step orchestral piece on the Wireless.

_No!_ Hermione's mind screamed. _You've gone utterly mad, Hermione Granger. _This was Tom Marvolo Riddle. This was Lord Voldemort. But, she thought very distantly, this was also a handsome young man who seemed like perhaps he might use the memories she had to craft a different future. Perhaps he might create a different timeline with less suffering. And he was awfully charming, and surprisingly kind. He'd taken her to a party and bragged about her to his old friends. He'd sought out information about this mysterious flat. He'd been considerate about her grief over Ron's ring.

"Don't worry, Miss Granger," he murmured down at her, "I am well aware that I am dancing with someone else's witch."

Hermione scowled at him. "Rule Number One," she reminded him, for she knew he'd been in her mind. "And, anyway, I am not anybody's witch. I am my own witch."

"You and Mr Weasley are one another's, then," Tom shrugged. "In any case, I know what this is."

"Do you?" Hermione was glad one of them knew, because she certainly did not. She sighed and swayed, feeling Tom's hand press a little harder against her back. "What is this?"

Tom licked his lip. "I told you that I do not put much stock in coincidences. I do not believe any of this is accidental. Not anymore."

"You think someone sent me here," Hermione guessed, and Tom's throat bobbed.

"Someone, or something. This does not seem like a chance mishap. And I mean to take full advantage of the potential I see."

Hermione narrowed her eyes and stopped dancing. "You mean to take full advantage of me."

"That is not what I said." Tom shook his head. "I believe you and I are principal players in a very complicated affair. You lived through a profoundly flawed timeline. Perhaps someone - or some force - saw fit to see to it that that timeline was altered substantially. I do not mean to make the same mistakes you saw me make. But neither will I let Albus Dumbledore -"

"Don't worry; he won't even speak with me," Hermione mumbled, realising at once that she ought not to have mentioned Dumbledore at all. She raised her eyes to Tom and started to release his hand, but he held her a little tighter and flicked his eyes up and down her form.

"We were enemies, you and I," he noted. "You had every reason to despise me, to fight me, and so you did. But we do not _need_ to be enemies. It isn't strictly necessary."

Hermione scoffed, ripping her hands off of him and stumbling back a step. "We are enemies. Still."

"You needn't be my ally," Tom told Hermione, "and we needn't be friends. But do remind me who else in this time is aware of your situation and is making any concerted effort whatsoever to assist you."

Hermione pinched her lips. "You're just trying to recruit me. To manipulate me."

"Or perhaps I've got a bit of a crush on you." Tom raised his eyebrows. "You are awfully pretty. And very intelligent."

Hermione's cheeks went hot again, and her jaw dropped. She shook her head quickly and insisted, "You are ridiculous."

"You're probably right about that." Tom nodded, still looking supremely confident. Suddenly a voice crackled over the Wizarding Wireless, cutting through the music.

"_We interrupt out broadcast of Miss MacLeod's lovely music to bring a report of a feud gone wrong between fans of the Wimbourne Wasps and Puddlemere United. Witnesses are reporting that drunken duels prior to the match have broken out on the grounds of the Wimbourne Quidditch pitch. The Ministry has already responded to break up brawls and to prevent breaches of the International Statute of Secrecy. Mediwitches from St Mungo's are on their way. We will keep our listeners apprised of this developing situation._"

Hermione stared at Tom, putting her hands on her hips. "I suppose Nott and Avery were caught up in that?"

"Probably," Tom shrugged. "I'm sure they'll be fine. See you at work tomorrow, Hermione. Oh. You know, I won't. I'm off to Wales in search of an artefact for Mr Burke. You'll have the shop to yourself. You'll manage fine."

"Right. Goodbye, then," Hermione said, realising she'd actually danced with Tom Riddle. He turned and started to go, and then he paused with his hand on the doorknob. He turned round and met Hermione's eyes again, and he suggested,

"Flourish and Blotts. I'm sure it was your second home in your own time."

Hermione nodded. "I was actually going to go there today to hunt down books on Time Travel. I'm going to get back to him. To Ron."

"Mmm-hmm." Tom's eyes looked distant all of a sudden, and he huffed out a breath. He quirked up half his mouth and nodded, and then he opened the door and walked out of the flat.

**Author's Note: Unhelpful Dumbledore! Tom finding information for Hermione! Tom accepting that he needs to change the timeline! Tom and Hermione **_**dancing!**_ **Now we're starting to delve into actual Tomione territory, my friends. Please do review.**


	8. Chapter 8

The bell over the door of Flourish and Blotts chimed merrily as Hermione opened the door. Hogwarts students were newly back to school, and the Christmas season had passed, so things were quiet in the Diagon Alley shops. Hermione appeared to be one of only three or four customers in the bookshop today. She got a nod from the thin, middle-aged witch behind the counter. Hermione walked up to the witch, who eyed her over a pair of spindly spectacles and asked in a prim burr,

"May I help you?"

"I'm looking for books on… erm, on time travel," Hermione said. "I've got a scholarly interest, you see, in time travel, so."

"Very good." The slender witch adjusted her spectacles and sniffed. "Well, we've a section on time travel upstairs, toward the back. Third shelf from the left. I highly recommend _Sands of the Hourglass: A Brief History of Time Travel Experimentation, _and _Leaps and Bounds: Giant Jumps Through Time and Their Calamitous Consequences._"

Hermione nodded her thanks, for those titles sounded promising. She turned and started climbing the staircase, pattering up the wooden steps as they creaked beneath her shoes. She felt rather bad, for she knew she didn't actually have enough money to go buying multiple books right now from Flourish and Blotts. What she could do was take her time scanning through the pages of the tomes, almost as though she were in a library. She sought knowledge right now, and she would do almost anything to get it.

"Miss Granger?"

Hermione turned at the sound of her name, and her mouth fell open in surprise to see Nathal Goshawk standing at a bookshelf, a small leather book open in his hands. His shoulder-length curls had been half pulled back, and he was wearing a sharp set of brown pinstripe robes. He flashed Hermione a little smile and shut his book.

"What brings you to Flourish and Blotts?" he asked, and Hermione avoided the shelf on time travel the witch downstairs had recommended. She shrugged and said to Nathal Goshawk,

"I've always been bookish. Got any good recommendations?"

Nathal held up the little brown book in his hand and smiled warmly. "I think I've settled on this biography of Fable Penn. She was an author in the 18th century who wrote -"

"_The Tale of the Desperate Rose._ Ah, a lovely early romance. Yes, she pioneered magical novel writing, and she overcame so many obstacles in her personal life. I've always found her fascinating. I've read that biography; it's very interesting." Hermione took a step toward Nathal and said, "Once you've finished reading about Fable Penn, I highly recommend reading her final work, _Nightingales in Paradise. _It's a truly lovely work. Tragic, but beautifully written."

"Thank you." Nathal's eyes studied Hermione's for a long moment, and his mouth opened and then shut again as he seemed to be considering something. Finally he asked, "Miss Granger, would you care to join me for dinner tonight in the Leaky Cauldron?"

Hermione broke into an awkward sort of grin. She wasn't sure quite what to do with Nathal's proposition. Was he flirting with her? It certainly seemed so. But she had Ron, didn't she? She was an engaged witch. And then there was Tom Riddle, who had danced with her, and… Hermione flashed Nathal an apologetic sort of look and explained,

"I'm not really… I'm not…"

"Available?" Nathal finished for her, and Hermione shrugged. Nathal smiled sadly and affirmed,

"I understand. I do hope to see you soon in the quill shop, at least. To discuss our shared love of reading."

"Yes." Hermione felt numb then as Nathal bowed a little and walked by her, trotting down the stairs. "Goodbye, Mr Goshawk."

Hermione gulped and made her way over to the bookshelf that the witch downstairs had recommended, the shelf full of time travel information. She dusted her fingertips over the spines of books and finally pulled out a copy of a book called _Leaps and Bounds: Giant Jumps Through Time and Their Calamitous Consequences._ She opened to the Table of Contents and found a chapter called "Attempts at Retrieval." She flipped to the chapter and began to read.

_We know from dozens of examples that time travel spanning a year or more results, inevitably, in radical alteration to the original timeline remembered by the traveler. Sometimes this spawns many alternate timelines. Sometimes it simply results in the time traveller's memories becoming null and void. What is certain is that time travel over great leaps of time renders original timelines irrevocably damaged, for better or worse._

_Attempts to retrieve time travellers have resulted in mixed success. If the time travel is over a short time frame, the traveller can often be brought back to 'their' time with minimal disruption to timelines and minimal damage to the traveller's body. When time travel extends through months, years, decades, or centuries, however, the consequences become dire. Never once has a long-distance time traveller been successfully returned to 'their' time without the retrieval resulting in dozens of unintentional Un-Births, seriously disrupted life paths, and moral consequences. Additionally, a time traveller has never actually survived an attempt at long-distance retrieval, in any of the recorded instances of attempting this act._

Hermione's heart sank. She shut the book and put it back on the shelf. She pulled out another book, this one a smaller tome on Ministry experimentation. She read for a long while on how the Ministry of Magic had actually used Azkaban prisoners for several centuries in time experiments, sending them through short and long bursts of time and then trying to return them using Time Turners and other methods of retrieval. But, as the other book had said, there was never a successful experiment that demonstrated safe movement through long periods of time.

Returning the book on Ministry time travel experiments to the shelf, Hermione pinched her lips and took out another book, this one a memoir of a wizard who claimed to have moved backward in time from the year 1911 to the year 1871. He wrote in vague terms of how confusing it was to have landed in a time he did not know, but to be surrounded by the first inklings and lives of people and events that would become familiar to him. Hermione thumbed through to the end of the book, which had been published in 1924. The wizard was old by then, and at the end of the memoir, he wrote that he had long accepted his new world, that his old lived timeline had been destroyed by his time travel, and that he was happy with his wife and children and grandchildren. Hermione wondered if the wizard was still alive, if she could seek him out and speak with him. But the very last page of the memoir read,

_Clarence died peacefully in October 1923. This memoir was published posthumously, at his request, by his family._

Hermione shut the book and shoved it back into the shelf. Her eyes welled as she realised just how very hopeless all of this was. Her engagement ring had Vanished into non-Being. She couldn't Apparate. She was being charmed by Tom Riddle. Albus Dumbledore refused to even meet with her.

And, it seemed, she had absolutely no way at all of getting home.

* * *

Hermione drummed her fingertips on the glass countertop in Borgin and Burkes and flipped the page of the book she'd spread out before her. It was a dusty little Potions manual, a handbook on using wild-harvested mushrooms. Hermione had absolutely no interest in it, but she'd already Scoured the shop twice and had cleared it of any potential pests. She'd organised two display shelves, one of cosmetic items and jewellery, and the other of antique musical instruments. She was too afraid to handle most of the other merchandise. One couple had come in just after the shop had open, in search of a crystal ball, which they'd purchased with minimal conversation. But now it was half past three in the afternoon, and nobody else had come calling.

The bell above the door tinkled, and the door swept open, just as Hermione wondered if Borgin and Burkes would ever see another customer. She shut the book on mushrooms and stood up straighter as two wizards, Nott and Avery, came blustering into the shop.

"Oh! Hullo, Miss Granger," said Nott.

"Good afternoon, Mr Nott," said Hermione. "How may I help you?"

"Is Tom here?" Avery asked, and Hermione knew why they'd come. Tom had scolded Nott and Avery for not doing their Christmas shopping at Borgin and Burkes. They'd promised to come into the shop soon. Well, that had been only a few days earlier. This was certainly _soon._ She flashed them a little smile and said,

"He's doing a bit of artefact-hunting for Mr Burke. I'll be very certain to let him know you were in. Are you in search of anything in particular?"

"Erm… well, I'm open to ideas," said Nott. Hermione pinched her lips and stepped out from behind the counter. She went over to a shelf and pulled off a scroll bound with a black ribbon. She handed it to Nott, who untied the ribbon and unfurled the scroll. Immediately, words began bleeding up through the parchment.

"_If in the morning when you rise, you still crave sleep behind your eyes, you may find useful to thy wake, two drops Invigoration Draught to take._"

Avery chuckled, and Nott guffawed as he looked up at Hermione. He handed over the parchment to Avery, and the words disappeared, before blackening back up with a fresh verse.

"_You wish for more success and pay, but heed the words to you I say. If it be true advance you seek, make Mondays better week to week._"

"It's like an advice column," Hermione japed, "only it's not as witty as it thinks it is, and it's not terribly good at poetry."

"I think it's terribly clever. But it could be dangerous if it gave bad advice," Nott pointed out, raising an eyebrow. Hermione sighed and shrugged.

"I suppose that's why we're selling it here. Two Galleons, if you're interested."

"Yes. I'll take it. Thank you." Nott walked up to the counter with Hermione whilst Avery examined an antique violin. Nott pulled two Galleons out of his pocket and plunked them on the counter, and Hermione opened the till and put them inside.

"It was so very nice to meet you at the party," Nott said, his voice rather slick. Hermione chewed her lip as she put Nott's advice scroll into a canvas bag for him. Nott continued, "Anyone Tom Riddle finds impressive is a friend of ours, you understand."

"I do understand, I think," Hermione said. Suddenly the door of the shop opened again, and Tom Riddle himself came sweeping inside in a hooded winter cloak. He pulled down his hood and stared at the scene before him.

"Nott, Avery," he greeted. "What a pleasant surprise. Afternoon, Miss Granger."

"I thought you weren't coming in today, Tom," Hermione said. Tom stalked into the shop, clutching something small in his hand. He cleared his throat and said,

"It didn't take me as long as I thought to… excuse me, all of you. I just need to go give something to Mr Burke. I'll be right back." He scooted behind Hermione where she stood at the till, and she frowned in confusion at his cold, detached hurry. He pushed open the door that led to the back of the shop, and Hermione flashed Nott a little smile. Then she called,

"Are you interested in that violin, Mr Avery? It's charmed to make one's playing ten times more beautiful than one's skill would allow."

"Well, I still don't think it would help me." Avery stood up straight. "I can't play a note."

"How about you, Miss Granger? Are you musical?" asked Nott, sounding genuinely interested. Hermione opened her mouth and hesitated. She shook her head and insisted,

"I took piano lessons when I was a little girl, but I stopped, you know… owing to…"

_The wars,_ her mind finished. In reality, she'd studied piano and ballet as a little Muggle girl until going off to Hogwarts, and then her attentions had turned purely academic and magical. She blinked and remembered her parents, the ones she'd Obliviated and then found. She remembered watching Harry and Ron and Ginny play Quidditch for Gryffindor. She remembered the little choir Professor Flitwick had run at Hogwarts.

"I see Miss Granger cajoled you into a purchase." Tom Riddle's voice jolted Hermione out of her reverie, and she sighed as she turned to see him walking back out from the back room. He moved up alongside her, and he used his wand to shut the till drawer Hermione had left open. "What did you buy, Nott?"

"He bought that silly advice-giving parchment, the one that writes poems," Hermione smiled. "My recommendation."

"Just don't let it tell you to eat chocolate biscuits at every meal, eh, Nott?" Tom winked. Nott grinned and nodded. Avery moved up to the counter and said,

"Listen, Tom. I wonder that you don't take a position at the Ministry. I'm sure they'd find you something."

"I'm not interested in working for the Ministry, and you know it," Tom said quietly. "I don't do well taking orders, Avery. Hmm?"

Avery looked a little baffled by that as his eyes flicked around the shop. Hermione knew why. It must have been very confusing to Tom Riddle's Pureblood cronies to see their one-time gang leader working as a shopkeep at Borgin and Burkes whilst the rest of them handled family fortunes or climbed Ministerial ladders. But Tom slid his finger over the corner of the glass counter and declared,

"No Ministry position would allow me the freedom I require. And all of you will come back to me, sooner rather than later."

Hermione shivered where she stood. She didn't like hearing Tom talk like that to Avery. But Nott looked entranced. He cleared his throat and said,

"Perhaps we'll have a dinner party sometime soon, Tom. All the old crowd, back together again, so that you can… you know, so things can get back to the way they were."

"I'd like that," Tom said. "Thank you, the both of you, for coming in. I'm sure you're busy."

Nott and Avery nodded, seeming to realise they'd been summarily dismissed. Both of them bowed a little, and then they turned and walked out of Borgin and Burkes. Once the door shut, Hermione let out a shaking breath and stared at the aged brass till.

"I did some research at Flourish and Blotts," she told Tom. "I discovered that time travel through many years at a time inevitably results in grave consequences, including but not limited to inescapable death for the time traveller if retrieval is attempted."

Tom was quiet. He shifted on his feet, and out of the corner of her eye, Hermione could see that he was unhooking his winter cloak and hanging it up behind him. He leaned on the counter beside Hermione and finally murmured,

"So you're stuck here."

"It does seem so, yes." Hermione's lips were dry. She shut her eyes and pressed a button on the till, releasing it and listening to its mechanical ping. She opened her eyes and said, "I wrote to Professor Dumbledore last night. I write a two page letter explaining so much, begging for help."

"And what do you think he will say?" Tom asked. Hermione pressed the same button on the till, watching it depress and raise as she said,

"I Vanished the letter before I sent it. He won't help me. He can't. Nobody can. It's not possible. The Ministry spent centuries experimenting with time travel in the most morally questionable ways. People have risked their lives trying to get time travellers back. And all of it points to one conclusion: once someone has gone through many years, that's it. They're gone."

There was more silence, and Hermione pressed the button again. Tom reached for her fingers, pulling them away from the till. Hermione flashed him an angry look, but he huffed a breath and told her,

"You're driving me mad."

"So sorry," Hermione mumbled. She started to pull her fingers away from his, but Tom held onto her hand and whispered,

"I refuse to become the broken, dead monster you saw me become."

"I will not help you," Hermione insisted, but Tom shrugged and said,

"You already have helped me. You've shown me what I need to know to keep that from happening, I believe. Things are going to be very different this time around, for many reasons. You ought to know that."

"You've already done awful things," Hermione argued, pulling her fingers from his. "I know about what you did at Hogwarts, what you did in Little Hangleton. I know the kind of child you were at Wool's Orphanage."

"Fine. I am not a _good_ wizard, Hermione. But I refuse to become the fragmented, destroyed shell of a man I appear to have become in your existence. Things will not be the same."

"Tom."

Hermione stood upright from where she had been leaning onto the counter. Tom straightened himself and turned, adjusting his outer robe as Caractacus Burke came shuffling out of the back room. He held a beautiful ring out in his palm and said,

"Well done finding this. Keep it in the front display case so it sells. Three hundred Galleons."

"Yes, Mr Burke." Tom took the ring, and then Mr Burke turned back and disappeared again to the back of the shop without acknowledging

Hermione. Tom opened the glass case upon which he and Hermione had been leaning, and she studied the ring he placed down on the black velvet display. It was shiny silvery metal with inlaid oval rubies, and she asked him,

"What is it?"

"It is the ring of the Vampire Asharwa. Rumour has it that Asharwa would kiss the rubies of the ring after taking a victim, and that wearing the ring gives the bearer special, as-yet-uncovered powers."

"You went to Wales to get it," Hermione said softly. "How did you find it?"

Tom sighed. "I… negotiated… with a witch who had had it in her possession for some time."

Hermione pursed her lips and shook her head. He was awful, she thought. He was a wicked man, wasn't he? Terrible and -

"Hermione."

She jolted, for he'd used her first name. Hermione stared at him, agape, and his throat bobbed a bit. He blinked at her and asked,

"Nathal Goshawk?"

Hermione furrowed her thick brows. "Rule Number One, Tom."

He frowned, his cheeks colouring. "He asked you to the Leaky Cauldron."

"_Rule Number One,_" Hermione hissed. "No Legilimency. And, anyway, I said no. I told him that I wasn't available to eat with him, because I'm not available. I'm engaged."

"Right." Tom cleared his throat. He stared out the window, for it had begun to patter a light rain outside. It looked freezing cold, and Hermione shuddered just watching the weather turn. Tom asked, as he looked out the window, "Did you buy any books?"

"The problem with me in a bookshop, Tom, is that I could very easily buy a thousand books. Unfortunately, I've hardly got any money," Hermione said. "It's fine; there are books in my flat. A few of them look especially interesting. I thought tonight I'd read _A History of Magical Photography_."

Tom curled up his lips a little and murmured, "On a day like today, with freezing rain pouring from the heavens, a good book and a cup of tea does sound nice."

"Is that your way of inviting yourself to my flat?" Hermione asked, and Tom sighed lightly.

"You could come to my flat on Charing Cross Road," he said, "but that seems more… uncouth."

Hermione and Tom managed to mostly work around one another until the shop closed, and then they put their winter cloaks on and put up their hoods. Hermione stood outside the door of Borgin and Burkes as Tom locked up the door, and she said,

"I'm, erm… off to eat some dinner, then. Goodbye, Tom."

"See you." He watched her walk away, and Hermione decided that tonight she was going to brave the freezing rain and make her way to Diagon Alley.

As she sat in the Leaky Cauldron eating pumpkin pasty and potatoes, she thought that perhaps she had gone mad. She could not stop herself from thinking about Tom Riddle in ways that she absolutely, positively should not be thinking about him. She could not stop thinking about his straight, long nose, nor about his curled lips. She couldn't stop thinking about the dark glint in his eyes, or of his wavy near-black hair. She couldn't stop thinking of the crisp scent he carried about him, of the way he was tall and lean as he managed to loom over people yet move smoothly about.

He was a terrible man, she thought. He would become a horrid danger to everyone he encountered. But then, he'd promised her today that things would be different, that he would not grow into the hideous monster she'd seen him be. He had vowed to her that the Lord Voldemort she had known would not come into existence. And Tom Riddle had been charming, and kind, and almost gentle. He was no Beast here, she thought. It was odd, the way a sliver of her mind was unable to fully despise him.

She paid for her half-eaten meal and walked back to Knockturn Alley in the sleet, her wand illuminating her way through the darkness. She climbed the stairs to her flat and opened the door, and once she was inside, she pulled off her cloak and hung it up. She shivered and kicked off her shoes, padding across the floor.

"_Nox,_" she whispered, and her wand's light went out. She went over to the bookshelf on the wall and found the copy of _A History of Magical Photography, _and she pulled it out. She went to the threadbare divan and curled up in one corner, opening the book and beginning to read about Muggle daguerreotypes and the advent of capturing images. She contemplated getting herself some tea, but before she could, there was knocking on her flat door. Frowning, Hermione set down her book and rose, walking over to the door and opening it.

"Tom."

He stood there in his rain-soaked cloak, his hood down, a leather book in his hands.

"I have come to read," he said. Hermione barked out a laugh and stepped aside.

"Erm… certainly. All right. Why not? Would you care for some tea?"

"Lovely." Tom stepped inside and shut the door, unclasping his cloak. He hung it up with Hermione's, and as she went into the kitchen and set to work filling a teapot with water and boiling it, she asked over her shoulder,

"What book did you bring?"

"_Nightingales in Paradise,_" said Tom lightly. Hermione froze. It was the work by Fable Penn that Hermione had recommended to Nathal Goshawk. She poured hot water into two teacups and carried them into the sitting room, setting the saucers down on the low table before the divan.

"Have you read it before?" she asked, and Tom smiled a little as he admitted,

"Romance novels are not my preferred genre."

"Nor mine, but Fable Penn is always worth a read," Hermione argued. Tom flipped through the pages of his book and nodded.

"I shall take your word for it, Miss Granger."

"Hermione," she corrected him, for he'd used her name earlier in the shop, and she'd rather liked it. She watched his cheeks go a little pink, and he nodded.

"Hermione. How was the Leaky Cauldron?"

She dragged her teeth over her lip. "Better than the White Wyvern."

"Mmm." Tom reached up and pushed his hair away from his forehead carefully. Hermione felt a dull thud in her head - Legilimency - and she knew what he was looking for. He was wondering if she'd eaten with Nathal Goshawk, or if she'd gone alone. Hermione shut her eyes and covered her thoughts with a blanket of black velvet to shut Tom out, and she whispered,

"I am engaged to Ron Weasley."

"I wonder how true that still is," Tom said. She wanted to get into a fight with him then, to snap at him that _of course_ it was still true. But her ring had Vanished, and Ron was not here, and Hermione had absolutely no way of getting home. So how true was it, really, that she and Ron Weasley were going to get married? Hermione let out a long breath, and when at last she opened her eyes, Tom was staring right at her. He'd set his book aside, and he said seriously,

"I am going to do things differently now that I know what your mind has already shown me."

"I am not going to help you," Hermione told him again. He pinched his lips and leaned toward her.

"I find you to be very pretty," he said, "and quite intelligent. You are more than a little magnetic in a way that might be annoying if you weren't also profoundly useful."

_Useful._ Hermione winced at the word, but Tom reached up and cupped her jaw in his hand. She flinched at first, at being touched by him, but then her body naturally melted against his fingers, and she found herself whispering desperately,

"I can't be a part of… I can't…"

"You and I don't have to be friends, Hermione, but we also do not have to be enemies." Tom leaned even closer, so close that she could smell pine and leather on him now. His mouth drew near to Hermione's, and he whispered,

"_Rule Number Two - _No attacking you. Please, Miss Hermione Jean Granger, may I kiss you?"

She sucked in air hard and nodded, and he pressed his lips to hers. She reached desperately for his shoulders, her breath trembling in her nostrils. Her mouth opened on instinct, and he broadened the kiss just a little. His tongue grazed over her bottom lip, and then his teeth, and then he sucked just a little at that lip. Hermione gasped, shocked by the way he was really, genuinely kissing her, and as he pushed his lips to hers again, a little noise escaped her. She pulled back, staring at him with frantic eyes. He let his hand fall from her jaw, and he said softly,

"I rather wish, right now, that I could break Rule Number One. But I won't."

Hermione felt confusion wash over her. She _wanted_ this wizard, badly. She wanted _him_, Tom Riddle. She wanted him so badly that her skin prickled and warmth spread through her veins. She found herself muttering,

"I think we should just read now."

"Tea's gone cold. I'll warm it up," Tom said, aiming his wand at the teacups. Hermione felt numb as she picked up her book on photography and stared at the pages, pretending to read and reliving his kiss over and over again in her mind.

**Author's Note: Uh-oh. Things are starting to get serious. He's jealous of Nathal Goshawk. Hermione's witnessing him start to rally up the old crowd. He's promising things are going to be different this time… and they **_**kissed.**_ **Buckle up, folks.**


	9. Chapter 9

Hermione Scoured the taxidermied Demiguise that had come into Borgin and Burkes earlier that morning. The dusty relic had been in a Shacklebolt attic for decades, apparently. It remained half-Vanished, with one arm and leg solid but invisible. Hermione cast spells on the Demiguise's fur and marble eyes to rid it of the dust, and then she whispered,

"_Reparo._"

The artefact began mending itself of the years of wear and tear that had tangled its fur and ripped at the taxidermy stitches. Hermione huffed, feeling satisfied that she'd done all the could to make the Demiguise appealing to a buyer. She flicked her eyes up to where Tom Riddle stood examining a pair of cufflinks behind the counter, gazing at them through a loupe, and she tingled.

He'd stayed until eleven the night before, reading and drinking tea until they'd both grown tired. Then he'd murmured a goodnight to Hermione, and at the door as he'd been leaving, he'd taken her face in his hands and bent to kiss her again. She'd wound up kissing him back, somewhat earnestly, going up onto her tiptoes and threading her arms around his shoulders. She eyed him now and wondered just what Ron Weasley would say if he knew that Hermione Granger had kissed Tom Riddle.

"How's that Demiguise?" Tom asked quietly, and Hermione licked her lips as she said honestly,

"It's better now."

"Good. Twenty-five Galleons for it, Mr Burke said." Tom set down his loupe and Banished the cufflinks into a cupboard behind him. "Those are Muggle rubbish. Can't believe Mr Burke fell for them."

"Oh." Hermione blinked. She thought, for a moment, of suggesting that he pawn them in a Muggle shop and exchange the money to Galleons, but her scruples stopped her short. Before she could say anything, the door to Borgin and Burkes opened, setting the bell to tinkling. A red-haired wizard in a pointed orange hat came waddling into the shop with a heavy-looking rucksack slung over one shoulder. He reached into the bag and pulled out a newspaper, and he said jovially,

"Got the _Daily Prophet _here for you."

Tom reached into his pocket and pulled out a coin, trading the money for the newspaper as the blustery ginger wizard passed over the _Prophet._ The wizard nodded in greeting to Hermione as he made his way out of the shop, and when the door shut, Hermione felt a crackle of tension in the air.

"Hermione," Tom said, caution rippling through his voice. He held up the newspaper, and Hermione read the blaring headline.

_WHERE IS ALBUS DUMBLEDORE?_

Hermione frowned as she approached Tom, walking around the counter until she stood beside him. He set down the newspaper on the counter, and the two of them began to read in silence.

_Albus Dumbledore, best known for defeating Gellert Grindelwald in the greatest duel ever recorded, did not return to his teaching post at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry after the Christmas holidays. Indeed, none of Professor Dumbledore's colleagues or friends report seeing him since the third of January, when he was spotted speaking with his brother Aberforth in Hogsmeade Village. _

'_I thought perhaps that Albus had gone away on some personal business,' said Hogwarts Headmaster Armando Dippet, 'but became concerned when classes resumed and he was not at his teaching post. Multiple attempts to make contact with Albus Dumbledore have been unsuccessful.'_

_Aberforth Dumbledore says that he and his brother Albus discussed 'a private matter' on the third of January in the Hog's Head, and refused to elaborate. He says his brother walked out of the pub with the intention of going back up to the school. But Horace Slughorn, Potions master at the school, reports that Albus Dumbledore was absent thereafter._

'_No one knows where Albus has gone,' says Slughorn. 'All we can hope is that he is safe and sound where he is. Certainly, given how dearly his students are missing their teacher, some sort of communication from him would be appreciated.'_

_Minister for Magic Leonard Spencer-Moon states that if Albus Dumbledore does not make contact with his family or colleagues within the next week, a squad of Aurors will be deployed to search for him. The Daily Prophet realises that the apparent disappearance of a figure as significant as Albus Dumbledore looms large in the consciousness of our readers, and we shall keep all apprised of any information we learn._

Hermione took a step back from Tom and stared up at him. Her bottom lip shook.

"What have you done, Tom?"

He scowled. "What do you mean, what have I done? I haven't done anything."

"Liar," she hissed. "You've done something terrible to Professor Dumbledore."

"What nonsense," Tom scoffed. "I haven't seen the man in ages. Mind you, there's plenty I'd love to do to Albus Dumbledore, but don't for a moment think I underestimate him. He defeated Gellert Grindelwald. I know what he's capable of, and though I consider myself a competent wizard, Hermione, I am no fool. I haven't done anything to Albus Dumbledore."

"Well, someone's done something to him," Hermione said rather loudly. "He's disappeared."

Tom just stared at her, for so long a moment that Hermione felt her chest thunk. She finally threw her hands up.

"What is it, then?"

"Your engagement ring Vanished," Tom said softly. "Albus Dumbledore has disappeared, seemingly into thin air. I have told you that I do not believe in coincidences."

Hermione's mouth fell open in disbelief. "You think all of this is connected to my time travel?"

"To altering timelines," Tom nodded. "You've done the research. Going through decades results in radical consequences, doesn't it? Un-Births. Whole new people. Broken pairings and newly forged alliances. Disappearances."

"I don't…" Hermione shut her eyes. "I don't think Albus Dumbledore would have disappeared because I time traveled."

"What if _he_ went somewhere, too?" Tom murmured. Hermione opened her eyes, and as she prepared something to say, Tom continued, "What happened to you, in the world you left behind? Did you leave a gaping hole in that life? Were there newspaper articles about how Hermione Granger, war heroine, had vanished into the night?"

"You're suggesting that Albus Dumbledore traveled the same way I did?" Hermione breathed. "Why? So that he could stop you?"

"I don't know," Tom admitted. He lowered his eyes. "I'm thinking out loud. I suppose there must be a great many timelines. I do know from what research I've done on my own that time travel creates splinters. Threads. It would seem to me that you could leave one thread and go to another. If that happened to you, why couldn't it happen to Albus Dumbledore?"

"So…" Hermione felt her breath hitch in her throat. "So I've moved back in time to a world that may not have an Albus Dumbledore in it anymore?"

"I don't know," Tom said again. "I do not have all the answers, or any of them, really. I have many questions, but no real answers."

Hermione shook where she stood. The door to the shop opened again, and Abraxas Malfoy came sweeping into Borgin and Burkes. His slick blond hair was tied neatly back, and he pulled a tidy cap off his head as he walked inside. He cleared his throat and smiled a little, saying slickly,

"Hello, Tom. Miss Granger. I see you've read the _Prophet._"

"Interesting news," Tom said. Hermione watched his throat bob. "Any theories, Abraxas?"

"I think the old nutter's got a secret lover in a hideaway on a beach in Spain, and he was tired of the cold," sneered Abraxas. He let out a snicker then and dragged his finger over the corner of the counter. "In all seriousness, it is odd, to say the least. Dumbledore is nothing if not powerful. Something's amuck. Foul play is the only reasonable explanation. Anyone who stood with Grindelwald will need to expect to have their houses turned inside out by the Ministry over this."

He gave Tom a weighty look, as though Hermione didn't know exactly what Abraxas meant. Malfoy Manor would have been a central headquarters for British support of Grindelwald, she thought. And surely most of Tom's old friends had sided with Grindelwald in the conflict. Tom nodded at Abraxas and said,

"I think it would be wise to have a little dinner party. You, Lestrange, Nott, Avery, Mulciber. Cygnus and Druella. In uncertain times, it is good to know that we have friends to stand with us, don't you agree?"

"Quite so. I'll host the dinner at Malfoy Manor; does Thursday night suit you?" Abraxas asked. Tom nodded, and Abraxas said, "I'll get owls out today. Miss Granger, you simply must come. You're our friend now, too. Aren't you?"

There was weight in that question, and Hermione knew that it mattered - it really did matter - how she answered. She flicked her eyes to Tom and then back to Abraxas, and she gave him a minute little smile.

"I'd be honoured. Thank you."

"We'll be coming by Floo," Tom said cautiously. Suddenly Hermione remembered that she couldn't Apparate here, even by Side-Along. They still weren't entirely certain of why Ron's engagement ring had vanished off of Hermione's finger, nor why Hermione couldn't Apparate on her own. But it seemed entirely unsafe to Apparate at all. She wondered distantly if Floo Powder was any better, since it was still magical transportation through space, but all she could do was hope for the best and get a bit dusty. Abraxas looked surprised and said,

"Of course. The Floo fireplace is in the burgundy parlour on the main floor; just come down the corridor to the dining room when you arrive. Shall we say seven o'clock?"

"Thank you," Hermione said again. Abraxas turned to go, putting his jaunty little black hat back on as he headed outside. Hermione turned to Tom and gave him a sceptical look. He raised one eyebrow and told her,

"Don't worry; my flat's on the Floo Network. Number twenty-three, Charing Cross Road. It's an easy walk from the Leaky Cauldron."

Hermione shut her eyes and gulped. Dumbledore was missing. Her ring from Ron was gone. She had no way home. She'd kissed Tom Riddle. And now she was going to her second social event with the people that would become her enemies.

What, Hermione wondered, had become of her?

* * *

"I don't mean offense in asking, but where the blazes did you come up with enough money to buy _that?_" Tom gestured to what Hermione was wearing. She grinned where she stood outside the door of his flat. She tipped her head and informed him,

"It's my green silk gown. I did a fair bit of Transfiguration work on it. Then I cast Enduring Charms to keep the changes in place all night. Hopefully I'm not the Cinderella of the evening…"

"It's, erm…" Tom cleared his throat and stepped aside. "Come in."

Hermione followed him into his flat. She'd changed the mint green silk of her gown to be rich midnight blue velvet. The long, tight sleeves had been altered into a draping style. She'd swapped out the metallic silver trim for gold. She'd styled her hair in a curly bun on the back of her head, with just a few tendrils hanging loose, and she'd smoothed beautification creme over her features. She wore the same pearl pendant she'd Conjured for herself to wear to Cygnus Black's birthday party. Hermione thought perhaps she did look rather pretty in her midnight blue gown. She'd tried awfully hard to look pretty. But it had been a bit awkward walking down the sidewalk through Muggle London in what would appear to be an Anne Boleyn costume.

"So, you live here," Hermione noted. She glanced around the small but elegantly-appointed flat, with its crown moulding and its traditional little kitchen. Somehow, this apartment had survived the mid-century Muggle attack of style, as well as the ravages of war.

"This entire building is owned by a wizard," Tom explained. "All of the tenants are magical, even though the building is on a Muggle street."

"Oh, I see." Hermione nodded her understanding. She sighed and studied how handsome Tom looked in his formal robes. He was wearing a white waistcoat and a white bow tie under a crisp black tailored robe. He'd styled his hair very carefully. He was holding his wand, and he adjusted his grip as he said to Hermione,

"Dumbledore is still missing."

"Yes. No one can stop talking about it," Hermione nodded. "I know him. He would often go off on missions, but to leave the entire wizarding world wondering about him, leaving people to write scandalous newspaper articles speculating about him? That's not the Albus Dumbledore I know. He's really missing."

"And you have no inclination to try and find him?" Tom raised his eyebrows. Hermione parted her lips and admitted,

"I thought of going to Mould-on-the-Would, or of exploring the places I think he might go in search of things that might help him stop you. But, first of all, I can't Apparate. And he didn't want to speak with me. And something tells me, in my deepest heart of hearts, that when Albus Dumbledore walked out of the Hog's Head and said he was going back up to Hogwarts, something happened. He really did disappear. It's like you said. He travelled, just like I did. That's what I've come to believe."

"And do you think he will ever come back?" Tom asked. Hermione blinked.

"It's all so very different now," she whispered. "All of it."

Tom stepped up to Hermione and put his hands on her cheeks. His wand pressed along her jaw, and as he bent down, he murmured,

"Perhaps this is a 1947 that nobody has ever really experienced before."

"Perhaps," Hermione replied. "I have no idea what to think."

"Then don't think." Tom closed the gap between them, brushing his lips against hers. His breath was warm he mumbled, "You're very pretty tonight. All the time, but tonight most especially."

Hermione shut her eyes and thought of how badly she wanted him. She wanted more than this, for some reason. She wanted more than his hands on her cheeks. She wanted more than his lips on hers. She drew herself up against his body, moving toward him until her chest touched his. She wondered distantly what his bedroom looked like.

"I'll show you. We can be late." Tom pulled back and raised his eyebrows. Hermione scowled, her stomach twisting.

"Rule Number One, Tom."

"S0rry." He did not sound so very sorry. He sniffed and turned toward his fireplace. Hermione followed him, thinking that the fireplace did not look nearly large enough to use for the Floo Network. But Tom pulled a cut crystal container off the mantle and held it out to Hermione, and she reached in to take a fistful of the ashy powder. She crouched down and moved sideways into the fireplace, and she tossed the Floo Powder.

"_MALFOY MANOR!_" she exclaimed. Green flames erupted around her, curling and whisking her up and back. She moved through blackness with a frigid _whoosh_, and then she was suddenly stumbling forward out of a much larger fireplace. Hermione coughed and sputtered, pulling her wand out of the holster at the hip of her midnight blue velvet gown. She dragged her wand around her body and muttered, "_Scourgify. Scourgify._"

There was a flash of green fire, and Tom Riddle came striding confidently out of the fireplace. He used his wand to quickly clean himself, and he smirked at Hermione as he aimed his wand at her. She recoiled in fear, but he said softly,

"You've got soot on your face."

"Oh." She let him clean it off, and then she tucked her own wand away. She looked around the elegant burgundy parlour in which they'd landed, and she saw that Tom was standing with his arm extended to her. He wanted her to walk in there with her again, just like she'd done at Cygnus Black's party. She sighed and said,

"People really are going to think we're together."

"Would that be positively the worst thing?" he asked, "right this moment?"

Hermione pinched her lips and threaded her hand up through Tom's arm. She let him lead her out of the parlour and out into the corridor of Malfoy Manor. Suddenly she froze, and she blinked, looking around. She was rocketed to the memory of Luna being held prisoner here, of Draco Malfoy refusing to reveal that he knew Harry Potter here. Bellatrix Black had carved the word _Mudblood_ into Hermione's skin here. She dragged her thumb over the place where Bellatrix had tortured her. On instinct, she peeled back the draped sleeve of her midnight blue gown and studied the spot where the word had scarred into her flesh. The scar had faded over the last few years, but the word _Mudblood _would always be a part of Hermione's body. What Bellatrix had done had left an indelible mark, the same way Voldemort's curse had left a scar on Harry's head.

But Hermione scowled in confusion as she peeled back her sleeve and stared at her inner forearm. The place on her skin where she'd dragged her thumb a hundred times - the place where Bellatrix had carved _Mudblood_ \- was smooth and flawless. Hermione raised her eyes to Tom Riddle, her gaze wide and searching. She felt the press of his Legilimency, and for once, she did not scold him. She felt him witness the scene where Bellatrix had used a curse to draw the awful letters into Hermione's skin, the way Hermione had shrieked in terrified pain. She felt Tom relive Hermione showing the injury to Harry and Ron, then trying to heal it up with some Essence of Dittany. He saw the scar go pink and white with time, though it never completely went away.

Tom seized Hermione's forearm and stared at the skin. He dragged his thumb over the area where the scar had been, and he let out a shaking little breath as he murmured,

"Yes, Hermione. I think it's safe to say you've already changed a great many things by coming here."

"Tom! Miss Granger! We can't start without you." Abraxas Malfoy appeared down the corridor, and Tom and Hermione looked up. Tom lowered Hermione's arm, but he did not release her. Instead, he threaded his fingers through hers, and he pulled her toward Abraxas. Hermione tried to recoil from him, from the way he was holding onto her, but something within her told her to let him hold her. He led her toward Abraxas, and the three of them walked into the dark, wood-paneled dining room.

Everyone at the table stood when they entered, and Hermione wondered whether that was for Tom or for her. Feeling a bit uneasy, she sat in the chair Tom pulled out for her, and he sat beside her. Right on cue, a plate full of scallops in butter appeared on the plates before them.

"So, Tom," said Avery from beside Hermione, "we're all dying to know what you think about Dumbledore."

There were sounds of agreement from the others, and Hermione nervously eyed Tom as she poked at a scallop. He sipped the white wine that had been provided, seeming supernaturally calm. He sniffed a little and said,

"I suspect one of Albus Dumbledore's enemies has finally gotten the better of him. I think we all know that Albus Dumbledore has, for many years, had a great many enemies."

"Do… do you know anything about what's happened to him?" Cygnus Black III asked cautiously. He looked downright afraid. Beside him, Druella looked like she wanted to strangle Cygnus for speaking up at all. But Tom just sighed and shook his head.

"No, Cygnus. If I knew, I would be profiting from the situation somehow. Unfortunately, I'm as in the dark as you are."

"Do you suppose Dumbledore will come back?" asked Nott, shoving his curls from his face. Tom took a bite of scallop before answering. He sipped more wine, and finally he said,

"I suppose that depends on where he is, Nott, and his state of being."

"Right. Enough talk of Albus Dumbledore," scolded Abraxas Malfoy. "I think we all know full well that the Ministry will come calling to each of us about him if he isn't back at Hogwarts soon enough. Too much talk of him, or even thought of him, will do no good. Wild speculation will do no good. Isn't that right, Tom?"

"Quite right, Malfoy." Tom looked around the table. "Albus Dumbledore may never return. Or he may waltz into Hogwarts tomorrow. What is certain is that he is not fond of any of us, so keep your heads down on this matter until we have more definitive answers on what's going on. I shall stay in contact with all of you regarding this, hmm? These scallops are delectable, Malfoy; how did you know I so liked seafood?"

"I remembered from school," said Abraxas proudly. The conversation shifted to Quidditch then, and Hermione nervously ate her food. After the scallops came a course of squash soup, and from beside Hermione, Avery asked,

"How's work in the shop treating you, Miss Granger?"

"Oh. I rather like it. Or, at least, it isn't so very bad." Hermione smiled weakly at Avery. He grinned broadly back and her and said,

"Nott and I have been having entirely too much fun playing with that advice parchment you sold him. But I never did find anything. I'll come in soon, and you must help me find a little trinket."

"Of course," Hermione said. Tom cleared his throat to her right, and when she looked at him, he said matter-of-factly,

"You needn't trouble Miss Granger, Avery. I've just the thing for you the next time you come in. Occamy scale powder… it works well to attract witches. Goodness knows you need it."

Hermione flicked her eyes back to Avery to see that the wizard's cheeks had flushed dark red. He laughed nervously, and Hermione frowned at seeing Avery so embarrassed. She prepared to scold Tom, but then Druella said a bit loudly,

"No, Cygnus! If I want pink peonies as my wedding flower, you shan't stop me!"

"I merely want it to be a dignified affair," Cygnus Black mumbled, touching his napkin to his lips. Hermione tried not to laugh, and Tom sipped his wine before saying,

"Do try to reserve the marital disputes for after you're actually married, will you two?"

The main course was roasted goat, and then for dessert there was rose cake. Hermione managed not to converse very much throughout most of the remainder of the meal, choosing instead to eat in silence as she thought about Ron and Harry and Albus Dumbledore. But finally, as she chewed a bite of rosewater-infused cake, she heard Tom telling Abraxas quietly,

"The shop's obviously been operating much more smoothly since Miss Granger arrived, so."

She looked up, surprised by his compliment. He seemed engrossed in conversation with Abraxas, so she just gulped and took another bite of cake. Abraxas asked,

"Does Mr Burke show any sign of retiring?"

"He's as stubborn as a Hippogriff," Tom said dismissively. "He'll be running that shop until his heart stops beating. I don't mind the current arrangement; he sends me out to hunt down valuable artefacts, I spend some of my time in the shop, and Miss Granger does the thankless work of keeping the sheep sailing, as it were."

Hermione ate the rest of her cake without saying anything at all. She rose with Tom as the plates cleared, and she was wobbly on her legs. She realised she'd had four glasses of wine, one with each course of the meal, and that she was downright tipsy. She grabbed at Tom's arm and whispered at him,

"I'm just a little drunk."

He smiled at Abraxas, not acknowledging what she'd said, and he clapped the tall blond wizard on the shoulder.

"Malfoy. Thank you for hosting. Tonight was important, I think."

"Indeed." Abraxas waved to Cygnus and Druella, who were making their way to the corner of the room to Disapparate. Nott and Avery were standing and chatting animatedly about something, and Mulciber skulked off and vanished into a black whorl in thin air.

"We'll meet again soon, all of us," Tom told Abraxas assuredly. "Whatever happens with Dumbledore, unity among this old group of friends will be critical. We'll need to present a united front, among ourselves and to whatever may face us from the Ministry. I do hope I can count on all of you the way I was able to at Hogwarts."

"I know you can, Tom," Abraxas said. "You can certainly count on me."

"Goodnight, then." Tom curled up his lips. "We'll go back the way we came. Burgundy parlour?"

"Quite so," Abraxas nodded, looking confused again about why they were travelling by Floo Network. But Tom led Hermione out of the dining room without another word, his back ramrod straight. Hermione stumbled just a little, and Tom hummed down at her,

"Funny, what drinking through an entire meal will do to a rather small witch."

"Well, it was a lot of wine on offer," Hermione huffed. She walked with Tom into the burgundy parlour and opened the china container on the mantle. Hermione giggled like mad, and when Tom scowled at her, she protested, "It looks like someone's cremated remains. Oh, it's awful."

He cocked up an eyebrow. "You did have too much wine."

Hermione stifled a smile and shook her head. "You're right. It isn't funny. Ron's not here. Dumbledore's missing."

"You're allowed to laugh," Tom said, and when she met his eyes, he nodded and repeated, "You can have a little fun whilst you're here."

"Says who?" Hermione demanded, and he took a fistful of Floo Powder.

"Says me." He backed into the large marble fireplace and flung down the powder, exclaiming, "_TWENTY-THREE, CHARING CROSS ROAD, FLAT 2B._"

Hermione followed after him, roaring through the cool green flames as the Floo Network dragged her from Wiltshire to London. She had to crawl to get out of Tom's smaller fireplace, and as he helped her up, she knew she was absolutely filthy. He laughed uproariously at the sight of her, and she coursed her fingers over her mussed bun.

"I'm a disaster," she complained. "Covered in soot."

"You are, a little." He pulled out his wand and started moving it all around her, Scouring her hair and her face, her sleeves and her neck, her skirts and her wand. There was something deeply sensual about it, about the way he pulled the tip of his wand about her body, murmuring cleansing spells over and over. He had soot on his own cheek, and he quickly cleaned himself up, but by then, Hermione's breath was coming in quick, shallow pants through her nose.

"Tom," she whispered, and he just nodded as he tucked his wand away. She reached up then, taking his jaws in her hands and pulling him down to her. He seemed surprised at her initiative, at the way she'd led the kiss, but he happily delved in. One of his hands went to her waist, and the other wrapped around her and went between her shoulder blades. He pulled her closer and sucked on her lip a little before pushing his mouth against hers more firmly. Hermione moaned softly, dragging her thumbs under Tom's eyes.

Suddenly she was being backed up toward a wall, and she stumbled a little from the wine. She gasped when her back hit the wall, tossing her face up toward Tom and sinking her teeth into her lip when he moved his mouth from hers. He began to kiss at the skin beneath her ear, planting careful kisses in a long row up her neck. His lips dragged, his tongue wet and warm, and he suckled a little on her earlobe before whispering,

"Hermione."

"Oh." She had no idea what to do with this, with any of this. One of his hands had crept up her torso and was squeezing at a small breast through the material of her velvet gown. His other hand still held fast to her waist. He ground his hips forward a little, and Hermione felt the first proof that he wanted her, rubbing against her belly and making her itch with something she knew she ought not to feel. She tipped her head as he kept kissing her neck, and she muttered again, rather helplessly, "Oh."

He pulled back, staring down at her with lips glistening wet from kissing her and swollen from the effort. She reached up and dragged her thumb along his bottom lip, shivering with longing, and his eyes fluttered shut. He rolled his hips forward again, and she felt the insistent firmness in his trousers grind onto her stomach. He kept his eyes shut as he informed her,

"I want more than this."

"Erm…" Hermione gnawed so hard at her lip that she tasted the iron tang of blood, and she thought distantly of Ron moving atop her in the bed with the rose-patterned sheets. She covered the thought with inky blackness; that was not a thought for Tom to witness. She opened her eyes, unsure of what to say. Before she could say anything at all, though, Tom said,

"I think you should probably go home. Or… you know, back to the flat in Knockturn Alley."

Her mouth fell open in surprise. Didn't he want her? Had he been lying?

"You've had four glasses of wine," he said rather sharply, "and as far as I know, you still mostly hate me. So I do not suppose I shall opt to lose my virginity under circumstances which -"

"You're a _virgin?_" Hermione interrupted. Tom's face flushed scarlet at once. His throat bobbed, and he took a little step back. He shrugged and then crossed his arms over his chest.

"And? So? What of it?"

She blinked. "You're… you're twenty-one years old, and you're _Tom Riddle, _as in… the most handsome and eligible and charming young wizard who -"

"I told you," he snapped, "that witches have been a distraction for me for quite some time now. I never made time to snog them in the Slytherin Common Room, much less drag them to my flat for playtime. It would have debased me to do so, anyway."

Hermione licked her lip and realised she'd bitten herself so hard earlier that she was still bleeding. She considered healing herself up, but instead she just licked the blood away and asked,

"Would it debase you to do those things with me?"

"No," Tom said simply.

"Why not?" Hermione asked. Tom shook his head.

"It just wouldn't. But I'm not doing it tonight, because you're four glasses deep into wine, and you still don't actually enjoy my company, so -"

"That's not exactly what I've been saying," Hermione pointed out, and Tom raised his eyebrows.

"Another time, perhaps," he said quietly. "Thank you for going to Malfoy Manor with me tonight, Miss Granger. Shall I walk you back to Knockturn Alley?"

"I can see myself home," Hermione insisted. She headed for the door, her velvet gown moving heavily around her. Suddenly Tom grabbed at her wrist, and Hermione whirled around. She glared up at him, about to chastise him for snatching at her. But he bent down and crushed her mouth with his, and she squealed a bit. She reached up to cup his cheek, realising that she was holding Tom Riddle, kissing Tom Riddle, and she sighed helplessly. He finally released her, and his dark eyes glittered as he said,

"Sometime soon, you'll… well, there's a first time for everything, isn't there?"

"Yes, Tom," Hermione said. "There's a first time for everything."

"Goodnight," he said, and Hermione reached behind her to open the door.

"Goodnight."

**Author's Note: Dumbledore is missing! The scar from Bellatrix's torture is missing! The would-be Death Eaters are beginning to gather! And Tom Riddle is a virgin! So much good stuff coming up, y'all.**

**Thank you so incredibly much for all the great feedback. I value it more than I can say. **


	10. Chapter 10

Hermione dragged her fingertips along the edge of a shelf full of little glass objects for sale. There was a bell hovering over a tarnished mirror, too, and she flicked it with a fingernail until it chimed. Then she picked up a strange little dome of smooth brown glass and turned it over in her hand. She frowned and held it up, looking to where Tom was reading Friday's copy of the _Daily Prophet._

"Tom," she said, and he glanced up at her. "Have you got any idea what that is?"

He smirked and lowered his eyes to the newspaper. "That's a contraceptive device. I think Mr Burke dated it to the late 1600s."

"A contraceptive device!" Hermione recoiled, setting the little dome of glass back down on the shelf. "Why are we selling _that?_ Effective contraceptive charms have been around for over three hundred years!"

"Well, it's an interesting antique," Tom said, sounding amused. Hermione stared at the glass object, wondering just how a witch was meant to use it. Before she could think too much harder on the matter, the door to Borgin and Burkes opened with the tinkle of the overhead bell, and Hermione turned around. A tall, broad wizard with a pointed brown beard and round spectacles came in, his grey wool cloak billowing about him in the wind. The door shut behind him, and he nodded at Tom before his gaze settled on Hermione.

"How do you do," he said. "I'm looking for a Miss Hermione Granger."

Hermione's mouth fell open, and she flicked her gaze to Tom for a moment. He appeared to be studying the wizard who had come in with great intensity, and Hermione wondered if Tom was in the other man's head. The wizard with the pointy beard pulled off his slouch grey cap and said,

"My name is Brendan Duncan. I'm an Auror with the Ministry of Magic. I have a few questions for you, if you'll come with me."

"I think you should stay here, Miss Granger," Tom said softly. Brendan Duncan gave Tom a strange look, but then he reached into the breast pocket of his robes and pulled out a folded bit of parchment. Hermione tentatively stepped near Mr Duncan and took the parchment, unfolding it and reading Dumbledore's spindly script.

_Dear Miss Granger,_

_Do not ever try to go back. Some fools' errands are risks not worth taking._

_Yours very sincerely,_

_Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore_

Hermione glanced up at Tom. He walked around the counter and neared, taking the little note in his own hand and studying it. He stared at Brendan Duncan, the Auror, and asked,

"Where was this found?"

"It was found on Albus Dumbledore's desk in his office at Hogwarts, among his belongings," said Mr Duncan. "It was inside an envelope addressed to a Miss Hermione Granger in Knockturn Alley. What does he mean, Miss Granger? Go back where?"

Hermione gulped. She shook her head and lowered her gaze. "To my old life, I think."

"And what is that old life?" snapped Mr Duncan. "You see, Miss Granger, you're a bit of an enigma to the Ministry of Magic. We have precisely no record of you."

"I didn't attend Hogwarts," Hermione said. "My magic is self-taught. I'm Muggle-born; I couldn't attend school because of the wars, and I -"

"You were eleven years of age well before the Second Muggle World War erupted." Mr Duncan narrowed his eyes. "Why didn't you go to Hogwarts?"

"My parents wouldn't let me," Hermione said desperately. Her ears felt hot, and she knew her face was red as she lied. Tom stepped forward a little, and he said in a slick voice,

"Miss Granger's parents were wholly unwilling to accept the idea of their daughter having magic. It's a wonder she didn't wind up an Obscurial. Truly, I'm amazed at that. Whilst the rest of us were off getting our magical educations, Miss Granger taught herself magic in the secrecy of the Muggle world. Her parents perished in the Blitz."

"Why does Mr Ollivander have no recollection whatsoever of selling you a wand?" Mr Duncan demanded, and Hermione carefully touched at the holster on her hip. She swallowed hard and said in a shaking voice,

"When I was eleven, my wand chose me. It came to me at my parents' house. I didn't get it from Mr Ollivander; I'm not sure where it came from."

"Lies! You're telling lies." Duncan loomed over Hermione then, and suddenly a door slammed.

"What is all this bloody racket?" exclaimed Caractacus Burke, emerging from the back of the shop. "An Auror in Borgin and Burkes; what's this?"

"You've hired some sort of criminal, Mr Burke, and we're going to get the bottom of it," said Duncan in a dangerous voice. He jabbed an accusing finger at Hermione, and she stumbled back a step as he said, "This witch has a wand whose maker doesn't remember selling it to her. She has magical abilities with no formal training. She seems to have appeared out of thin air. Meanwhile, a letter written to her warns her not to 'go back,' and was written by a man who has _disappeared_ into thin air. This all reeks of… of…"

"Say it," Tom hissed, and Hermione blinked in surprise. She stared from Tom up to the Auror, who blustered for a moment before shaking his head and insisting,

"No. It can't be."

"Say it," Tom whispered again. "You've got it all figured out."

"We'll check Muggle death records." Duncan tipped his chin up. "We'll figure out if her parents were really killed in the Blitz."

"And if they weren't?" Tom challenged. "What if the reality is that you simply have before you a very capable witch with a perfectly functional wand, a witch with no backstory… and a missing wizard who left her a cryptic letter? What then, Mr Duncan?"

"Then, Mr Riddle," Duncan said quietly, "I think the Ministry of Magic will have some more questions for Miss Granger."

"I have no idea where he is," Hermione informed the Auror. "Professor Dumbledore. I don't know where he's gone. But if you want my opinion… he isn't coming back any time soon."

"I want you out of my shop," barked Caractacus Burke from behind Hermione and Tom. "I don't want the Ministry here. Get out."

"We'll be in touch, Miss Granger," said Brendan Duncan meaningfully. He tucked the letter from Dumbledore back into his robes and huffed out of the shop, letting the door slam shut behind him.

* * *

Hermione listened the wind rattle the panes of the window in her little bedroom, and she squeezed her eyes shut. No matter what she did, sleep was not coming tonight. Puffing out an exasperated breath, Hermione figured that a cup of tea wouldn't do any harm, and she tossed her legs over the side of the bed. She glanced up at the ticking clock on the wall and read that it was nearly midnight. Well, she thought, at least she didn't have work in the morning.

On a Friday night at home, she thought, she and Ron and Harry and Ginny would stay up with Butterbeers, laughing and chatting. She and Ron would listen to the Wireless as she flipped through _Witch Weekly_ and complained about how it gave young witches body image issues. Ron would grunt back that she was probably right. He'd drone on about Quidditch, and she would nod inanely as though she cared. Harry and Ginny always seemed to have more conversation material between them, Hermione thought.

Now, she brushed her thumb over the fourth finger where Ron's engagement ring had been and wondered if he had been Un-Born. Or, at least, she thought, perhaps her time travel had made it so that the two of them would never become engaged. Perhaps that was why her ring had vanished. Perhaps the world she'd left, the world where she was to become the wife of Ron Weasley, was gone forever. Hermione had no idea what to do to ever make that right again.

She went into her little kitchen and began brewing herself a cup of tea. She boiled the water and let it cool just enough to pour it over a tea bag, and then she carried her tea cup toward the sitting room. She was halfway toward the divan when there was soft knocking upon the door that led from her flat to the corridor outside. Hermione was instantly alert, setting down her tea cup on the kitchen counter and snatching her wand. She dashed over to the door and opened it slowly, aiming her wand like a weapon.

"Will you put that down? It's me."

"Tom?" Hermione lowered her wand. "It's midnight."

"Who did you think it was?" He smirked at her over the threshold of her flat. She was about to say that it could have been anybody - it could have been Aurors - but then she saw the way he was looking at her. She realised at once that she was wearing her short black nightgown and a pair of knickers… and precisely nothing else.

"Erm…" Hermione glanced up and down her own form and resisted the urge to grab her winter cloak to cover herself. "Would you like some tea?"

"I just wanted to… talk." Tom sounded hollow and distant. He followed Hermione into her flat, and she shut the door behind him.

"What did you want to talk about?"

"If you'd like to go get dressed, I can wait." He cleared his throat roughly, starting to strip off his travelling cloak. Hermione pinched her lips and crossed her arms over her chest.

"What did you want to talk about at midnight, Tom?" she asked again.

"That Auror who came into the shop," he said simply. He stuck his hands into the pockets of his trousers and stared down at Hermione. "I couldn't sleep thinking about it. They're going to tear records to shreds trying to figure you out, and when they do figure you out, they're going to try and send you back."

"Well, perhaps that isn't the worst thing in the world," Hermione shrugged. "I should like to get home to Ron, and -"

"Your engagement ring disappeared," Tom said harshly, "because the world you left behind no longer exists. They'd be sending you forward in time to some alternate timeline that's foreign to you. And you've done the research, Hermione. Does anyone survive time travel retrieval? Anyone?"

Hermione felt her lips go cold. "No."

"So, we mustn't let them get ahold of you." Tom stepped up to her and looked like he wanted to touch her. "We mustn't let them try to return you to the year 2000, Hermione. On this one thing, Albus Dumbledore and I do agree."

"Why do you care whether I stay here or whether I die getting sent forward to same strange timeline?" Hermione spat. "You're Tom Riddle; what do you care what happens to the witch who worked to destroy you?"

"I still think it is by far the most preferable course of action to keep you here," Tom said calmly, "for a great many reasons. Rest assured that I have already sent owls to every contact I have in the Ministry of Magic, at Hogwarts, and in shops in Hogsmeade and London to help this situation."

"Help how?" Hermione demanded. Tom tipped his head.

"Certain documents will need to be forged and planted. Memories altered. People Confounded. Some of this work, I'll do myself. Some of it will be outsourced to my friends. But I will work diligently, Hermione, to get the Ministry off your tail. Albus Dumbledore may have disappeared like your ring, leaving behind nothing but bread crumbs for the Ministry in a note, but he also gave us a clue. The future has changed. It is not an option to send you forward. You must stay here. The Ministry must be thrown off entirely."

Hermione shut her eyes and shook her head. "This feels… I don't know. It feels wrong, but somehow it also feels like the only thing to do."

"As I understand it, Miss Granger, you have spent a good deal of your life being a consummate rule-breaker," Tom teased. Hermione frowned up at him, and he licked his lips as he said, "I'll let you get back to sleeping. Sorry to wake you."

"You didn't wake me," she said. "I couldn't… I was awake."

"Oh." He nodded. "Insomnia all around, then. Hmm."

He gazed down at Hermione for a moment, his dark eyes glittering at hers as she felt herself go a little bit breathless. She shrugged and shook her head as she whispered,

"Not even once?"

"What do you mean?" he asked, and she clarified,

"Not even one Slytherin girl in some dusty classroom? One witch you met in the White Wyvern? A girlfriend?"

"Girlfriend," Tom spat the word with a measure of disgust. He shook his head. "No, Hermione. Not even once. So sorry to disappoint you."

"I'm not disappointed." Hermione pinched her lips and let out a long breath. She stared at her forgotten cup of tea, reckoning that it must have gone cold by now. She coughed quietly and asked, "Aren't you just a little bit curious about it?"

Tom shifted on his feet. "I suppose it's probably fine. People seem to get rather absorbed by it all."

Hermione frowned and scratched at her head. "Ron… erm, I don't exactly have many points of reference, but Ron and I…"

"I find I am not very interested in what you and Ron Weasley did together physically, Hermione," Tom snapped. She turned her eyes to him, and his brows had furrowed deeply. His cheeks had gone pink, and he mumbled, "Besides the fact that it is none of my business, I simply don't care."

"Sorry," Hermione grumbled. She walked over to her cup of tea and sipped at it, swigging down lukewarm, over-steeped black tea. She cleared her throat and turned back toward Tom, who shrugged and flicked his eyes about.

"I always assumed it was just an unnecessary indulgence. A waste of time. So. Anyway… it's late. I ought to go."

"Do you always run away when things become the slightest bit uncomfortable?" Hermione asked, and Tom glared at her.

"I'm not running away. It's past midnight, and you're standing here in your nightgown. I'm trying to be gentlemanly by going home."

"It wasn't very gentlemanly to come at all," Hermione shrugged, "but here you are."

Suddenly she realised that she was the one actively trying to get _him_ \- Tom Riddle, who would grow to be Lord Voldemort - to stay in her flat. She gulped past the knot in her throat and approached him, lacing her arms up around his shoulders as his eyelids slowly shut.

"I think you want to stay," she told him, "but I think you're afraid to stay."

"I'm not afraid," he said through clenched teeth. "Afraid of what, of sex?"

"Maybe so," Hermione said lightly. "Could it be that a witch's body terrifies Tom Riddle?"

"No," he snarled. His hands went to her waist, and he pulled his fingertips up along her ribcage. One of his hands slid around her back, and the other grasped at a breast through the thin material of her nightgown. Hermione leaned against him, dragging her fingernails along the back of his head as she whispered,

"I do think you're just a little afraid of what people do in bedrooms, Mr Riddle."

"Stop that," he snapped. "You're being ridiculous."

"Am I?" She wanted him, all of a sudden, and she felt like a fool and a harlot. His face was so handsome. His hands felt good on her. His breath was warm as his lips touched at her forehead. He was taunting her with how very desirable he was, simply by standing before her. She ought to hate him, but right now all she could do was want him. She couldn't think of her past, of the future, of Dumbledore or the life she'd left behind. None of it was real right this very moment. But he was. Tom Riddle was real. His hands, touching at her chest and back, were real. His mouth, pressing against her skin, was real.

"Tom," she mumbled, and her right hand snaked down between them. On instinct, she made a move to cup his growing erection, and she massaged him a little through the material of his trousers. He hummed onto her forehead, and she wondered distantly how many witches had touched him at all here. How many times had he been caressed properly?

"Stop thinking like that," he scolded her, and she glowered up at him.

"Rule Number One. Stay out of my head."

"I can't. Not when you're… _mmph._" He touched his lips to her forehead again, and his hands tightened on her. His fingers clenched at her breast, almost painfully, and his other hand splayed over her back. Hermione dragged her thumb over the length of his cock through the material of his trousers, and she moved her head a bit. He was panting through parted lips, and he finally whispered,

"None. Nobody."

At first, she had no idea what he meant, but then she realised he meant that no one had touched him like this. Nobody had handled his cock this way. Hermione felt a sudden surge of desire go through her veins. She really would be his first. She had no idea why that thought made her feel empowered, but it did. Perhaps it was because he was a very powerful wizard, with all the giftedness any sorcerer could ever possess. Perhaps it was because he was cocky and overconfident, because he had lackies to do his bidding and hang on his every word. Perhaps it was because she knew what sort of Beast he would become, if left unchecked. For whatever reason, there was something almost terrifyingly erotic in knowing that Hermione Granger herself would be the first true sexual encounter that Tom Riddle would ever have.

She found herself loosening his tie before she knew what she was doing, and he ripped it over his head and tossed it aside. His fingers fumbled with the buttons on his shirt, and Hermione saw then that he was trembling a little. That surprised her, so she made a move to help him undress. She stared into his eyes as she finished opening his shirt and pushed it off of his shoulders, along with his tailored outer robe. They crumpled to the floor in an unassuming pile. His belt came off with a bit of effort, and then the two of them grappled a bit at the buttons on his trousers as Tom kicked off his dragon-hide dress shoes. Hermione shoved at the waist of his trousers, and Tom finished off the deed of uncovering himself. He wriggled out of the trousers and peeled off his socks, and when he stood up again, he was completely naked.

Hermione gaped. Had Ron been small, or was Tom large, she wondered? She blinked, reaching hesitantly for Tom's cock. She wrapped her fingers around it, and Tom hissed at the feel of her touch. His eyes shut tightly and his fists balled at his sides as he whispered,

"You needn't flatter me in your head."

"I'm not flattering you. Perhaps Ron was exceptionally poorly endowed," Hermione said. "You could be perfectly average for all I know."

Tom smirked and opened his eyes. "I am not average, Miss Granger. In anything."

Hermione rolled her eyes and pulled her hand off of him. She unceremoniously stripped off her nightgown and tossed it aside, then rolled down her knickers and kicked them away. She stood before Tom in her own nudity, feeling only mildly ashamed. She'd been told that she was pretty by a fair number of wizards before. And Ron had always seemed perfectly aroused by her. Why shouldn't Tom find her suitable? Her body worked fine for the task at hand, she thought, and she was not ashamed of it, at least.

But she was unprepared for the wild hunger that came over Tom's face, the feral glint in his dark eyes and the way his lips fell open. His own fingers crept to his erect member and stroked a few times, and he mumbled,

"You're, erm… you're very… erm…"

"Thank you," Hermione said firmly. She approached him, feeling like all of this stripping and revealing was entirely too awkward. She folded his cock up between them and dragged her thumb over the tip, watching him shiver a little as she kissed at his chest. He bent down and pressed his lips to her cheek, but she laughed quietly and suggested,

"Why don't you kiss me properly, Tom?"

"What, like this?" He seized her face in his hands and crushed her mouth with his, and Hermione let out a little noise of surprised satisfaction. She kept rubbing at his cock with one hand, stroking his shoulder with the other, and she felt his fingers sink into the flesh of her backside. His other hand snaked into her wild hair and pulled her head back just enough to adjust the angle of the kiss, to deepen it. Hermione moaned as his tongue dragged over the roof of her mouth, as he pulled her lip between his teeth.

She wanted him. She wanted him _now._

Suddenly he was guiding them over to the threadbare divan, and Hermione was confused until she realised he meant to sit down. She tore her mouth from his and protested,

"There's a perfectly good bed in the -"

"This feels more appropriate," Tom said firmly. He sank down onto the divan and pulled Hermione down with him. She straddled his thighs, cradling his cock against her belly as she told him,

"I need to go get a wand. Contraceptive charm."

"I am more than capable of wandless magic, and I was present for the Matron's talk at Hogwarts," Tom sniffed. He pressed his palm to Hermione's lower abdomen and incanted carefully, "_Breviter Sterilitatem._"

Hermione was surprised to feel the familiar cooling spread of magic throughout her reproductive system, a sensation she'd grown accustomed to in the last few years with Ron. She cleared her throat and said,

"Right, well. I, erm… I'll just climb on, then, if you -"

"Wait." Tom slid his fingers along Hermione's jaw, and she stared straight into his eyes for a moment. She should hate him, she thought. She should hate everything about him. But her old world was gone, and she had no way home. Tom brought Hermione's face nearer to his, and he kissed her lips gently, speaking softly against her mouth.

"I have no idea why you are here. But I find myself rather glad that you've come."

She just nodded. She could crack some joke about how she didn't know why he'd shown up on her doorstep at midnight, but that she was glad he was here. Or she could say she was happy to be back in time, or she could say she just wanted to go home to Ron. But none of that felt like the right thing to say right now. So she just kissed Tom again, and she raised up her hips. She lined him up with her body, and she slid down, guiding him inside of her.

He tipped his head back and wrenched his eyes shut as Hermione began to rock and sway. He'd revealed his neck, so she leaned down and kissed him there, breathing in the heady aroma of him as he panted. His hands slid around her ribcage, down her back, settling on the cheeks of her bottom. He squeezed her there as she moved, and he seemed to like the feel of holding her there. Hermione worked her mouth at the skin beneath his neck, nibbling and suckling until she heard a groan rip its way from the bottom of his throat.

His hands slid down her thighs as she circled her hips up and forward, down and back, up and forward, down and back. His left hand went to her breast and started to pinch her nipple, dragging his thumb over the peak and making Hermione squirm a little. His other hand went between them and started to play with her clit, his thumb flicking so expertly that Hermione pulled back as she swayed and huffed breathlessly,

"You said you'd never done this before!"

"I've never done this before," Tom assured her. His voice was an oil slick, though his usually-coiffed hair was a disheveled mess and his face was pink. Hermione arched her back and quickened the movements of her hips, grinding against Tom rather roughly as his right hand deepened its pressure on her clit and his left hand cupped and massaged her breast.

"If you've never done this," she demanded through clenched teeth, "then how the blazes do you know what to do?"

"Intuition," Tom replied. Hermione would have accused him of using Legilimency, but he was already doing much better with her body than Ron had ever done, so clearly he hadn't been scanning her memories for ideas. Unless…

Unless he'd looked at Hermione's fantasies, at the deepest corners of her mind, for inspiration on how to touch her.

She glared at him, but he just let out a long breath and whispered,

"Kiss me."

She did, against her better judgment. She crashed her mouth against his and reached frantically for his face. She held onto him as their tongues tangled, and she started bucking her hips so hard against him that the divan creaked in protest, slamming against the wall a few times. Hermione squealed when Tom's fingers pinched her nipple to the point of delicious pain, and she was delirious with pleasure as his thumb drove hard circles on her clit.

_I'm going to come,_ she thought frantically. _It's already too late; there's no stopping it now; I'm going to come._

"Mmph!" Tom whined a keen against her, somewhere between want and need, and his hands started to shake where he touched her. Hermione snapped like a violin strung tuned too tightly. Everything went blindingly hot and white. Her ears rang, and pleasure shot through her veins like a lightning bolt. Her walls were contracting around his cock, she knew, and he'd feel that. Would he know what it was? Would he know what was happening to her?

Of course he would know, she scolded herself. This was Tom Riddle, not some bloody dolt off the street. He knew perfectly well what he was doing to her.

As she came down from her high, Hermione felt like she was made of jelly, and she whispered desperately against Tom's mouth,

"I can't keep… I'm…"

He wordlessly pushed her a little, turning their bodies until she was lying on her back on the divan. It was too short for them to stretch out properly, but Hermione kept her knees bent up around Tom's waist. He knelt between her legs and stared down at her as he murmured seriously,

"I only need a moment. Promise."

"Oh. Take, erm… take your time." Hermione shut her eyes, feeling foolish for some reason. She cast her wrist over her face as Tom started to thrust within her, and everything started to feel good again. She was wet, so very wet for him, and so he moved easily within her body. His movements grew a little quicker, then a little deeper, until at last he was ploughing Hermione against the protesting divan. She forced herself to look up at him, and then his movements stopped altogether. He froze mid-stroke, his face contorting into what looked like an expression of pain. His mouth dropped open, and his eyes screwed shut, and his cheeks and neck flushed scarlet red. His shoulders and arms tightened, and Hermione reached up to touch at them.

After what felt like a _very_ long time, Tom's softening cock slid out of Hermione's body, and a little river of fluids followed. Hermione made a slightly unnerved sound at the feel of the mess being made, and she muttered,

"Can you… get a wand, please?"

"_Tergeo. Scourgify._" Tom aimed his hand at the little disaster they'd created, and Hermione scoffed. Right. He was a very gifted wizard, lest she forget. She sighed and stood slowly from the divan, padding over to the pile of clothes on the floor. She sorted out her knickers and nightgown, pulling them on as she asked a bit awkwardly,

"Care for some tea or… erm, I think I've got some biscuits in the cupboard?"

"I'm fine." Tom cleared his throat and rose. He was limp now, but he seemed unashamed of his nudity. He started to dress as Hermione heated her cup of tea back up and gratefully sipped the liquid down. He'd made her very thirsty.

By the time Tom had dressed, Hermione felt queasy. What had she done? Had she betrayed absolutely everything she'd lived for in the world she'd abandoned? But then she watched Tom tighten his tie, and she realised that he could become a different wizard here. Albus Dumbledore had disappeared into thin air. Her engagement ring had vanished. And Tom Riddle did not have to become the wicked, despotic monster she'd known him to be.

Things could be different, she thought, just a little bit desperately.

"I see why people get so very caught up in all of that," Tom was saying. Hermione met his eyes, and he shrugged. "Sex."

"Oh." Hermione quirked up half a smile at him. She sipped her tea and said, "Yes, it's… rather enjoyable. Though, I confess, I've never had it like that."

"No?" Tom sent an eyebrow skyward. "Perhaps we both just need a little more practise, then, Miss Granger."

"Perhaps," Hermione mumbled, taking another sip. "It's so very late."

Tom curled up his lips and nodded. "I'll get all hands on eliminating the threat of the Ministry."

She remembered now that that was why he'd come - he'd come here to discuss the Auror who had shown up in Borgin and Burkes to question and threaten Hermione. And now Tom was engaging every resource he had to the end of ensuring that the Ministry did not attempt to send Hermione forward in time. She shifted on her feet and just said,

"Thank you, Tom."

He glanced away for a second, and then he smiled a little as if something were amusing him. "You know, I told myself this sort of thing was a waste of time. If only I'd known I was waiting for a time traveller. Goodnight, Hermione."

Hermione's eyes burned all of a sudden, and she just nodded as she stood there holding her cup of tea. It wasn't until after Tom had gone, until the door was shut, that she finally whispered,

"Goodnight, Tom."

**Author's Note: Woo hoo! Tom finally did it! And he's **_**good**_ **at it, because of course Tom Riddle wouldn't suck at it. But it looks like the would-be Death Eaters, Tom, and Hermione have their work cut out for them getting the Ministry off Hermione's tail! Thanks so much for reading. Please do review.**


	11. Chapter 11

On Sunday afternoon, Hermione walked into Magical Menagerie, figuring it was worth a look about. She missed Crookshanks badly these days, and all she could hope was that Ron was taking good care of him in whatever existence the two creatures were sharing.

Hermione ambled into the pet shop and was immediately greeted by the squawk of a large bird in a cage to her left. It fluttered its wings out almost menacingly and cawed at her again, and Hermione recoiled a bit. She heard the little whirring sounds of Puffskeins to her right, and when she turned, a few of them were in a small pen. Hermione walked slowly past a table with a thick glass case marked _STREELER - HIGHLY TOXIC - DO NOT HANDLE WITHOUT ASSISTANCE._ Hermione gazed at the kaleidoscopic giant snail for a moment, and then she heard a voice ask,

"May I help you, my dear?"

Hermione turned around to see a short, plump witch with kind, pale eyes and an enormous bun of white hair. She smiled at Hermione and held out her hands.

"Looking for a companion?"

"I, erm… I had a half-Kneazle," Hermione said, "but unfortunately he's gone now. I suppose I might like, you know…"

The witch's eyes softened, crinkling as her lips curled up into a warm smile. She took Hermione's hands in hers and said, "It is very difficult, isn't it, to even consider replacing a beloved pet? But they don't live forever. You had a half-Kneazle? How very interesting. I have just the cat to show you."

She took Hermione by the elbow and guided her past a wire crate of slick rats, a cage full of flittering yellow birds, and a calm-looking raven. At the back of the shop, sitting quite alert upon a purple velvet stool, was the most beautiful cat Hermione had ever seen. It was a Siamese cat with gleaming sapphire blue eyes, and it let out a little meow as it stared up at Hermione.

"She's called Porridge," said the witch who worked in the shop. "My husband named her, the old fool. But she's just the sweetest thing, and she's so wonderfully intelligent. Isn't she gorgeous?"

"She's absolutely beautiful." Hermione walked up to the cat and pet her smooth coat, smiling a little as Porridge smashed her head against Hermione's hand. Hermione sighed and shook her head. "Unfortunately, I can't afford a cat right now."

"I'll give her to you for ten Galleons," the witch said, but Hermione blinked and said quite sadly,

"I simply haven't got the money. Thank you, just the same."

"Well, I hope you change your mind. She seems to quite like you," said the witch. Hermione nodded and decided it was time to leave the Magical Menagerie. It was making her sad to be in there. So she walked back out, past the raven and the toads, past the rats and the toxic Streeler. She opened the door and emerged into a pattering cold rain, and she pulled up the hood of her winter cloak. But then she heard Tom Riddle's now-familiar voice call,

"Hermione!"

She whirled, and she saw him trotting toward her. She startled, alarmed to see him in Diagon Alley on a Sunday afternoon. He had his own hood up against the rain, and his wand was out. He rather brazenly took Hermione by the hand and said,

"How very lucky I've run into you. You can come with me."

He started walking south on Diagon Alley, and Hermione had to run a little to keep up with his long strides. She held his hand as she asked,

"Come where with you?"

"Ollivanders," he said, quite matter-of-factly. He looked down at her as the rain fell around them, and he said, "This morning, I went to the home of Brendan Duncan. I gave him a dossier of documents, which he will take to work on Monday. I also altered his memory and implanted some fresh ideas into his head."

"What sort of documents?" Hermione was hissing now, looking around in case anyone else was about. "What sort of ideas?"

"A Muggle birth certificate for Hermione Jean Granger, born 19th September, 1926 in a Muggle hospital in London," said Tom crisply as they passed a couple. He waited a moment, then said, "Death certificates for Bruce and Marilyn Granger, Muggles killed in the Blitz. A license for your Muggle father to practise dentistry. And a few other stray papers that prove you belong to this time."

Hermione balked, shocked that Tom had spent his Saturday forging documents and his Sunday morning Obliviating an Auror… for her. Or, at least, so that he could keep her here. She paused, making him turn to face her.

"What thoughts did you put into his mind?" she demanded, as the rain continued to fall around them. She shivered in the cold, but Tom seemed less affected. He shrugged and said,

"I erased all doubt. All of the ideas he'd begun to develop about time travel are gone from his mind now. He's got documentation proving that you are who you say you are, and he's got a memory of an interview with you in Borgin and Burkes that went very well. He thinks now that Dumbledore's letter was warning you not to return to the Muggle world where your magic was stifled. Brendan Duncan now marvels at the notion that you didn't become an Obscurial; he wonders at how marvelous it is that you managed on your own. He's going to file the dossier at the Ministry and move on with the investigation of Dumbledore's disappearance without pushing your origins any further."

Hermione gaped. Tom had used Obliviation, Confounding, Magical forgery… he had broken the law in so many ways just to keep the Ministry of Magic from trying to send Hermione forward in time again. She gulped, wondering just why he was taking her to Ollivanders. Then it registered. More Confounding. More Obliviation. She shut her eyes and nodded. There was no choice. They needed to tick all the boxes.

She walked with him, still holding his hand, until they reached the south end of Diagon Alley. Once they were there, he opened the door of Ollivanders and let Hermione step inside. Old Mr Ollivander looked hardly different from how Hermione had known him. Hermione breathed in the smell of old wood, of damp leather and weathered parchment. This was an ancient, sacred place, and they were about to defile it. She swallowed hard and said,

"Hello, Mr Ollivander."

"Mr Riddle," said Garrick Ollivander from where he stood behind the counter as Tom stepped into the shop. The door shut, and Ollivander turned his gaze to Hermione. "You must be the Miss Granger that's causing such a stir at the Ministry of Magic."

"Mr Ollivander." Tom's voice was so slick and smooth all of a sudden that Hermione felt her eyes go wide with alarm. She turned, and she could see that Tom had locked gazes with Ollivander, who shivered and trembled where he stood. Tom pulled out his wand and aimed it at Ollivander. He twisted the wand calmly and murmured, "_Obliviate._"

There was an interminable silence then, as Tom erased memories from Garrick Ollivander's head and replaced them with new thoughts. All the while, Ollivander just stared blankly ahead, his eyes open though he was clearly not conscious. Finally, he blinked, and Tom lowered his wand. Ollivander vibrated again - the Confundus Charm.

"Miss Granger. I am so very pleased that you managed a magical education all on your own. I was so terrified for you - a Muggle-born, with wars on the way. You know, an Obscurus is a very dangerous thing, and the aid of a wand can help tremendously. Even without your Muggle parents' support, I hoped that giving you an instrument of magic would at least channel your skills, help with your evident gifts. And I hear you have done marvelous things."

"Thank you, Mr Ollivander," Hermione said quite firmly. "Please, will you do me a favour?"

"Anything, Miss Granger, if it is within my purview," said Mr Ollivander. Hermione chewed her lip a little and said,

"If the Ministry comes calling, tell them all about how you gave me my wand those years ago to prevent me becoming an Obscurial, will you? It is, I think, such a fascinating tale."

"Indeed, Miss Granger," Ollivander agreed. "It was good to see you both again. You especially, Tom. I think we can all expect… well, something rather fantastical from that wand of _yours._"

Tom quirked up his lips, raising the hood of his cloak. "Good day, Mr Ollivander."

* * *

Hermione turned the page of the lurid romance novel she was reading and sipped at her glass of red wine. She raised one eyebrow in surprise at just how much detail the author of the book was getting into in a scene between a lusty Scottish witch and her burly lover.

_He sucked hard on her nipple as Fiona moaned with delight and tangled her fingers in his fiery red locks. His rippling muscles gleamed in the firelight, slick with sweat as Aengus -_

Hermione jolted at the sound of knocking on the door of her flat, and she nearly dropped both her wine and her book. She cleared her throat rather roughly and set the shameful rag of a novel down on the low table, along with her drink.

"Coming!" she called, and she rose to her feet. She thought distantly that at least this time she was answering the door fully clothed; the last time Tom had come knocking, she'd been in a nightgown and they'd wound up… well, she tried not to dwell too much on what had happened. It had been wondrous, in a way. He'd shown her far more pleasure than she'd ever felt with Ron. But it had been a little awkward, too, and once Hermione had met up with Tom this afternoon, she'd felt a quiver of embarrassment that hadn't accompanied sex for some time. Now she neared her door and promised herself that things would not escalate again. She opened the door and expected to see him staring at her with his usually steely glare. But instead he appeared to be wrestling a wet, protesting creature that was hissing at him.

"Damned claws on this thing," Tom was mumbling. "_Ow!_ That is my _stomach_, thank you."

"Is that…" Hermione's mouth fell open. Tom looked up and carefully adjusted his hold of the Siamese cat in his arms. He pinched his lips into a line, and Hermione looked at the blue-eyed cat he'd brought. Her eyes welled heavily as she clapped a hand to her mouth and whispered, "Porridge?"

"I broke Rule Number One," Tom said. "May I bring this creature inside, please?"

Hermione opened the door and stepped aside as Tom crossed the threshold. He set Porridge down on the ground and immediately began muttering,

"You'll need a litter pan for it; I can Conjure something up and you can Vanish the… well, you know. Anyway. They let her eat before I brought her here, but you'll need to get her some food in the morning before work, so -"

"You've brought me a cat," Hermione said rather disbelievingly. She watched as Porridge licked at the rainwater that had soaked some of her fur, and then she raised her eyes to Tom. Tears began silently streaming down her cheeks. "You've brought me a cat, Tom Riddle."

"Well, you wanted it, and I thought a loan would be awkward," he said tightly. He cleared his throat. "In any case, you are staying in this time permanently, so you ought to be comfortable here. You had that half-Kneazle, Crookshanks, in the world that probably no longer even exists. I figured you ought to have a little companion here, to make it all feel a bit more like home."

"I… I don't know what to say," Hermione breathed, and Tom suggested,

"You could say '_Thank you, Tom.'"_

Hermione shook her head wildly and threw her hands up. "Yes. Of course. I'm sorry. Thank you, Tom. I… thank you. Very much indeed. May I cuddle with her now?"

"I don't think Siamese cats are very cuddly," Tom warned, and he touched at the spot where Porridge had clawed him through his robes and shirt. But Hermione crouched down and pet the lovely cat, who burred a little sound of contentment and pushed her head up against Hermione's shoulder.

"She quite likes you," Tom noted.

"That's what the witch in Magical Menagerie said," Hermione declared proudly. She pulled Porridge into her lap and pet her again, and she smiled up at Tom. "Thank you."

Tom shifted on his feet and blinked a few times. "Does this make you happy?"

Hermione felt confused. Did he really care if she was happy? He was Tom Riddle. He was going to become Lord Voldemort. Hermione would be the witch who would hunt down and destroy his Horcruxes. She was engaged to Ron Weasley; she was best friends with Harry Potter. They were enemies, she and Tom Riddle. They might be colleagues, and they might have danced and kissed and shagged out of some misguided sense of lust, but they were still enemies, weren't they?

Weren't they?

"It does make me happy," she found herself saying.

"Good," Tom nodded. He lowered his eyes and asked, "Will you come to dinner with me?"

"I already ate," Hermione blurted out. But then she quickly realised he was asking her on a date of sorts, and she amended, "I'll come and sit with you and have a Butterbeer."

"No, it's all right." Tom licked his lips and glanced to her low table. "You've got a book, and wine, and a cat. No need for the White Wyvern tonight, hmm? I'll see you at Borgin and Burkes in the morning."

He turned to go, and Hermione carefully set Porridge aside. She pushed herself to her feet and walked over to Tom, taking his arm. He looked down at her, and she reached up to hold his face in her hands.

"Thank you for Porridge," she said again. He laughed under his breath and joked,

"I need some Essence of Dittany for what that damned cat did to me on the walk here from Magical Menagerie, so I hope you enjoy her."

"Thank you for what you did with Ollivander. With Brendan Duncan. With all the documents," Hermione said meaningfully. Tom huffed a breath, and his throat bobbed.

"So you're not cross?" He sounded almost surprised. "You're not still trying to work out a way home?"

Hermione shut her eyes for a moment. She pushed forth a memory, knowing Tom would feel it even if he weren't actively pressing into her with Legilimency. He was strong enough to sense something this emotional from her, she knew.

_It was Hermione's twentieth birthday, and everyone was eating cake that Molly Weasley had baked. Ginny and Harry were arguing about who the best Chaser in Quidditch history was, and Molly was telling them not to squabble, for goodness' sake; didn't they love one another? Ron started teasing Hermione that surely she had already turned twenty, because she'd used a Time Turner in their third year at Hogwarts, and George Weasley had pointed out that this was probably the most clever Ron had ever been. People laughed and complimented Molly's skill with fudge frosting…_

Hermione opened her eyes and shook her head as she stared up at Tom. She blinked through tears as she whispered,

"It's all gone, isn't it? My engagement ring is gone. Albus Dumbledore has gone… somewhere else. I can't Apparate here, much less safely travel decades through the future to a timeline that's probably destroyed or sideways or otherwise wholly inaccessible. So the least I can do is accept the gift of a cat here, and let you promise that things are going to be different."

"And if I promise that," Tom said, "that things are going to be different, will you let me keep kissing you?"

Hermione shrugged and nodded. "I don't feel as though I have much choice about that, either, Mr Riddle."

He cupped her jaw in his hand then and lowered his lips to hers, brushing them very gently together and then pressing a bit harder. Hermione felt Porridge rub up against her leg, and she smiled onto Tom's mouth as his fingers stroked her jaw.

"See you tomorrow, then," he mumbled. "I'm off to the White Wyvern. I'm starved."

"Goodnight," Hermione said. She was careful, as he slipped out through the door, not to let her new cat escape.

**Author's Note: Awwww. Tom's working hard to keep the Ministry off of Hermione, and he's buying her pets to keep her grounded in this time. Everything is so cute and adorable and fluffy and awesome and **_**nothing bad could possibly be coming up in the next chapter. **_**Right? RIGHT?**


	12. Chapter 12

Hermione threw open the door of Borgin and Burkes and hurled herself inside, breathless as she tossed down the hood of her cloak. Tom looked up from behind the counter and raised his eyebrows at her, and Hermione said,

"Sorry I'm late. I had to get Porridge a sack of food at Magical Menagerie, and they didn't open until eight, so -"

"It's no problem," Tom said. "Hang up your cloak."

Hermione undid her clasp and sighed, walking behind the counter and putting her cloak on the hook behind Tom. She thought then that she ought to greet him somehow, and as he turned toward her a little, she rubbed at his arm and said,

"Hello."

"Morning." He quirked up half his mouth. "Mr Burke has gone to Spain. Last-minute holiday, at his wife's insistence. She's weary of winter, apparently. Anyway, we're responsible for making sure the shop doesn't burn down over the next week or so."

"I think we can handle it," Hermione said. Tom held her face in his hands and bent down, kissing her very gently as he hummed,

"How's the creature?"

"Porridge. Her name is Porridge," Hermione said. She kissed Tom's lips again and answered, "She slept quite contentedly at my feet all night, and when I left this morning, she was curled up in a patch of sunlight on the floor."

"Hmm." Tom kissed Hermione again, this time more deeply, but then the bell over the door chimed, and he ripped himself away. Hermione stumbled backward a step, realising someone had come into the shop whilst they'd been openly snogging.

It was Reynard Lestrange, she could see. His face looked red and puffy, and he did not seem jovial or even surprised at having walked in on Hermione and Tom kissing. Instead he just sniffed a little and walked slowly up to the counter.

"Morning, Tom. Miss Granger," he said morosely. Tom stared at his old friend, seeming to be searching the young man for a moment. Tom's brows furrowed deeply after a moment, but Hermione just cleared her throat and asked as gently as she could,

"What can we do for you, Mr Lestrange?"

"I need a gift for… my wife…" Reynard's voice went thick then, and he shut his eyes, which swelled visibly with tears. "For Odessa."

"Has something happened with Odessa?" Hermione blurted. She shouldn't care, she knew. Odessa Lestrange was the mother of Rabastan and Rodolphus Lestrange, and they would grow up to become some of Hermione's fiercest enemies. Still, Odessa Lestrange was a young pregnant witch, and Hermione's stomach twisted at the thought of anything truly awful happening to her.

"Is she at St Mungo's now?" Tom asked Reynard Lestrange in a calm voice. Reynard nodded.

"Her mother's with her, and her sister's got Rabastan. They told me to go to the White Wyvern and _take a break._ I thought I'd come in here and get her a gift to take back to hospital."

Hermione was still so confused, until it registered to her what must have happened. Odessa had been pregnant, and now she was in St Mungo's Hospital. Her lips fell open a bit, and she cautiously dared to ask Reynard,

"Is the baby…?"

"Gone," Reynard moaned, nodding. "Odessa started bleeding, so we called a Healer. They took her to the hospital since she was so far along. The baby couldn't be saved, or was already… in any case. They've taken care of the matter, from a medical perspective, and now they've got her comfortable with Anodyne Draught and everything. But she's absolutely devastated."

Tom tipped his chin up and told Reynard, "The two of you are still very young. There's plenty of time for more children."

Hermione wanted to scold him that right now, Reynard Lestrange did not hear that he was young enough to keep on procreating. He needed to hear that his grief was valid, that it was perfectly reasonable to be devastated over the loss of this child. But Reynard nodded and said,

"I told Odessa the same thing, Tom. We've got loads of time to try again. I'd like to take her something special. Something pretty. Have you got something that glitters and shines for my wife, Tom?"

"We've got those sapphire and emerald earrings," Hermione said to Tom. "I think those would be lovely on Odessa."

"Hmm. Yes." Tom moved to his left and opened a glass display case full of jewellery. He pulled out a pair of earrings with round emeralds surrounded by tiny oval sapphires. He brought them over to Reynard Lestrange on a small black velvet display pillow and explained, "These were from the estate of Julia Malfoy, so they were probably worn for most of the 18th century. Aren't they lovely?"

"Odessa would like these," Reynard sniffed. "Thank you."

Hermione started to box them up and wrap them as Reynard paid Tom. Hermione handed over the carefully bound parcel and said,

"I'm very sorry for your loss, Mr Lestrange."

"Thank you, Miss Granger." Reynard nodded, and Tom said very crisply,

"If you should be of any need…"

"Thank you." Reynard bowed his head. He turned to go, and once he'd left the shop, Hermione pinched her lips and said to Tom,

"Another consequence of my time travel, then? An Un-Birth."

"You don't know that," Tom argued, "Unless you're certain about the dates of the Lestranges' children's births in the world you left behind."

Hermione considered again that she had no idea when either Rabastan or Rodolphus Lestrange had been born. Perhaps Odessa Lestrange had had a late miscarriage, a stillbirth, in Hermione's lived existence, too. Or, perhaps, Hermione's time travel had caused the child in Odessa's womb to become Un-Born, and this mess had come about. Hermione felt nauseated at the thought of it, at the consideration that her own time travel could mean entire people would never exist. Not that she'd meant to time travel in the first place, of course.

The shop door opened again, and in blustered the red-haired newspaper delivery wizard with the day's copy of the _Daily Prophet. _He handed it over to Tom, who paid the wizard for the paper, and the wizard went on his way. Tom walked back to the counter and set the newspaper down, and Hermione read the large, bold headline.

_ALBUS DUMBLEDORE STILL MISSING - THE WORST IS FEARED_

Hermione moved her eyes to the story beneath the headline and began to read as quickly as she could, scanning her gaze over the words in search of an answer to the mystery surrounding Dumbledore's departure.

_Albus Dumbledore's perplexing disappearance continues to baffle his brother Aberforth, his Hogwarts colleagues, and those he considers his closest friends. None of Albus Dumbledore's associates have received any word whatsoever of the man since he walked out of the Hog's Head and seemingly vanished into thin air. Hogwarts Headmaster Armando Dippet says the school has been searched using every method possible. A squad of Aurors has examined Hogsmeade Village, Mould-on-the-Would, Diagon Alley, and other familiar Dumbledore haunts for clues._

'_We have found little notes here and there, things Dumbledore scribbled down, unfinished letters,' stated Auror Brendan Duncan. 'We found loads of correspondence and material from the years he was waging conflict against Gellert Grindelwald. But we found no clues about him leaving, or where he might be going.'_

_Minister for Magic Spencer-Moon says that the Ministry is pouring every resource it can into finding Albus Dumbledore. 'After all,' says the Minister, 'Dumbledore is more than just the hero who defeated Grindelwald. He's also a beloved educator and a towering figure in our community. If something's happened to him, we owe it to ourselves and to Albus Dumbledore to quickly figure out what's going on. I swear to Britain's magical community that the Ministry is working at full force to find Albus Dumbledore and bring him home.'_

_For now, Dumbledore is still gone without a trace. But the Daily Prophet will keep its readers updated of any news on the matter._

Hermione stepped back from the newspaper and blinked. She stared up at Tom and asked,

"Do you suppose they worried like this in my time when I disappeared? War heroine Hermione Granger vanishes into thin air, disappeared from her flat? They might have suspected Ron; he was the last to see me. Do you think they sent a squad of Aurors to find me and bring me back home?"

"Maybe they did," Tom nodded. Suddenly the shop door opened for the third time that morning, the little bell overhead chiming with a merry sound that clashed with Borgin and Burkes' dark adornment. Hermione was about to greet the customer who had come in, but then she froze.

It was her neighbour, the witch with the twin white braids, stooped and deaf. It was the mother of the medium two doors down, Madam Mutatia. Hermione looked anxiously up at Tom, who mumbled,

"Can't say as I was expecting this."

The old woman shuffled into the shop, carrying what appeared to be a leather folio in her wizened hands. She kept her gaze down and did not greet Hermione or Tom. She walked slowly between the shelves of merchandise, appearing entirely disinterested in anything Borgin and Burkes had on offer.

"Good morning," Hermione said rather loudly. The old witch did not respond. She just walked up to the counter and set down the folio on the glass. She finally raised her milky eyes to Hermione, who wondered whether the witch was blind, as well. But then she opened her wrinkled mouth and said in a hoarse sort of whisper,

"I get deliveries sometimes."

"Deliveries," Hermione repeated, but the witch showed no sign of hearing her. She turned toward Tom and stared right at him. She nodded and said quite firmly,

"You'll be all right, boy."

Then she turned and started to limp out of the shop, dragging her foot a little as she walked. She pushed open the door of Borgin and Burkes and turned to her right, toward the shop where her daughter was a Medium. Hermione stared at the worn, brown leather folio that Madam Mutatia's mother had set on the glass display case. She reached for it, but Tom hissed,

"Wait! It could be cursed."

"You think that old witch would give us a cursed object?" Hermione asked. Tom scowled and declared,

"I can't see into her mind. At all. She's completely blank, the most skilled Occlumens I've ever encountered. And her daughter says she was once a powerful Seer, and that she rarely communicates with anyone these days. I'm meant to trust her? I don't think so. Let me examine this."

He pulled out his wand and aimed it at the folio, and he began murmuring counter-curses and revealing spells. Nothing happened, but Hermione let him keep going until she began to feel awfully impatient. Finally, she huffed and said,

"Tom, if there's one thing I learnt trying to destroy your Horcruxes, it's that sometimes you just have to leap with these sorts of things."

She reached for the folio, peeling it open. Tom made a little noise of protest, but Hermione ignored him. She pulled aside the protective piece of parchment at the front of the folio, and then her fingers began to shake.

There was a photograph, a moving magical photograph, inside the folio. Hermione pulled it out and stared at it, and her eyes seared at once. It was a portrait taken at a wedding. Hermione was the bride, dressed in a lovely gown of sleek silk. Beside her, his arm laced through hers affectionately, was Harry Potter. Hermione and Harry leaned in for a kiss, and the others in the photograph cheered them on.

Hermione's lips went cold as she realised this was photographic evidence of an alternate timeline existing where she'd married Harry Potter.

In the photograph, Ron Weasley had his arm around the shoulder of Lavender Brown. Neville Longbottom's fingers were laced through those of Luna Lovegood. And Ginny Weasley was standing awfully close to Dean Thomas. Everyone, it seemed, had found someone else to love than in the world Hermione had left behind. And as Hermione dusted her fingers over one area of the photograph, she realised something else, too. People had survived, in this alternate timeline, who had not lived in the world she'd known.

There was Sirius Black, looking proud and healthy as he gazed upon his godson getting married. There were Fred and George Weasley, with confetti bursting from their wands. Hermione's breath trembled ferociously between her lips as she studied the photograph over and over again.

"That boy with the glasses, the one you're marrying here, is Harry Potter," said Tom quietly from beside her. "The one who sent the Killing Curse back at me and put everything into motion."

"I…" Hermione looked upon everyone from her old life and set the photograph back down. She stared up at Tom and whispered, "I am not meant to be here. This is not my time."

Tom looked confused. "But that isn't your time, either, is it? You left a world where Sirius Black was dead, where one of those red-haired Weasley twins had been killed."

"His name was Fred," Hermione snarled. Tom sighed, and Hermione spat,

"You don't actually care about the world I left behind. All you care about is getting power and not losing it this time round. All you care about is that you don't wind up slumped in death in front of a crowd of people who hate you."

"Hermione," said Tom patiently, though it came out very condescendingly, "You and Harry Potter were never romantically involved, were you?"

"No." Hermione tipped her chin up and shrugged. "So?"

"So, this photograph just proves that time leads to splinters and breaks, that alternate timelines get created by time travel. The world in this photograph is entirely foreign to you, is it not?"

Hermione studied the photograph again and watched as she and Harry kissed. She winced a little at the motion. It was strange to see Harry press his lips to hers, odd to see Ron cheerfully root for the action. It was bizarre to see Neville and Luna paired up, to see Fred and George alive at Hermione's wedding. It was melancholic to see Sirius Black smiling and raising a glass of Champagne to toast Harry's wedding. Yes, she thought. The world in this photograph was just as strange and bizarre as the world of the Pureblood parties she'd been attending here in 1947. She knew nothing of a world where Harry Potter and Hermione Granger were husband and wife.

"I need to take the rest of the day off," Hermione informed Tom. "I'm sorry. Please tell Mr Burke that I'm ill."

"I'd lie to him for you," Tom said, "but he's on holiday, remember?"

"Oh. Right. Well. I'm going home." Hermione put the photograph in the folio and shut it. She tucked the folio up against her chest. "Dock my pay if you need to."

She walked around the counter, and she hustled out of Borgin and Burkes without another word.

Hours later, Hermione sat on the divan in her Knockturn Alley flat, on her third glass of wine, still studying the photograph of her wedding to Harry. Only then, after so much time spent ogling the image, did it occur to her to turn it over and examine the back. When she did, her jaw dropped, for she instantly recognised the spindly handwriting scrawled into the corner.

_Miss Granger,_

_You are precisely where you ought to be._

_He needs you there, the you that you are._

_Yours very sincerely,_

_Professor Dumbledore_

**Author's Note: Thanks as always for reading and reviewing!**


	13. Chapter 13

Hermione walked down Charing Cross Road and came to Number 23. She sighed as she pushed open the exterior door of the brick building, sandwiched between a little Muggle grocer and a bookshop that had closed for the night. Hermione stepped over the threshold into Number 23 and shut the door behind her. A man in his thirties, with a neatly cropped brown mustache, came pattering down the narrow staircase. He held a fedora and wore a warm-looking trench coat. He nodded at Hermione as he passed by her in the building's foyer. Hermione remembered what Tom had said, that this building was occupied by witches and wizards, and she wondered at the man's Muggle clothes. But then the wizard said warmly to Hermione,

"Good night for some fried fish, don't you agree?"

"Oh. Hmm."

"The place down the road has finally opened back up," he told her. "Been closed since before the Blitz."

"Has it?" Hermione's voice was weak. The wizard put his fedora on his head and walked out the door of the building, and Hermione pinched her lips. She began to climb the stairs, ascending to the first floor. There was a Puffskein skittering down the corridor, and a door on the first floor opened as someone hissed rather angrily,

"There you are, Bubbles! Get in here; we've been looking for you all evening!"

The mauve Puffskein purred a contented little sound and scooted into the flat, and the door shut. Hermione climbed another flight of stairs, and by now her heart was racing in her chest. She stepped down the corridor until she reached the door that read _2B_, and then she raised her fist and knocked three times.

She pulled at her pleated skirt to straighten it, and she thought of Dumbledore's writing on the back of the photograph. He'd sent her a message, she'd come to realise, through space and time. Somehow, Albus Dumbledore had brought her an image of an alternate timeline where she was married to Harry, where Sirius and Fred were alive. More significant than the mere fact of Dumbledore's communication had been the content of his message. She was right where she was meant to be, Dumbledore had said. _He needs you there, the you that you are._

The door to Tom Riddle's flat swung open, and he stood before Hermione wearing a crisp white shirt with the sleeves rolled up. His shirt was untucked from his trousers, and his black tie was loosened around his unbuttoned collar. His throat bobbed, and he said simply,

"Hello, Hermione."

"Tom," Hermione said, steeling herself, "I have come because… because I have received communication through time and space."

"Come in, before anyone hears you," Tom said quickly. He stepped aside, and Hermione followed him into his flat. He shut the door, and she looked around the elegant little place. She wondered, distantly, if he was breaking Rule Number One right now. She cast an inky blackness over the idea of Dumbledore's note on the back of the photograph. She didn't want Tom getting too cocky. She pinched her lips and resigned herself to the fact that she and Tom were probably going to share things with one another now, things she would have instinctively hidden from him.

"Albus Dumbledore wrote on the back of the photograph," Hermione huffed. "He told me that I am right where I ought to be."

Tom looked surprised. He seemed to be processing the idea that Albus Dumbledore had travelled away from this timeline and moved to some alternate existence, a place where Hermione's wedding to Harry Potter had been photographed and Dumbledore had written a note on the back of the picture. Tom seemed to be making sense of the idea that Dumbledore had somehow sent the photograph itself to Madam Mutatia's deaf old mother - a spy, an ally? A Seer with other abilities that transcended the ordinary?

"So, do you agree with Dumbledore?" asked Tom. "Do you think he's right, that you belong here? That you're where you're meant to be?"

"I'm beginning to think that perhaps it might be so," Hermione said quietly. She stepped closer to Tom. "You said yourself that everything would be different. That you wouldn't become the monster I watched you devolve into, that you wouldn't ruin everything like you'd done in my lived existence."

"Everything is going to be different," Tom promised. He sniffed. "I have put a good deal of thought into it. I can, I believe, have a great deal of success and authority without dividing myself so thoroughly that I destroy myself. I can become a dominant force without unraveling everything you valued. It is possible. Lessons can be learnt from the memories you've shown me."

Hermione felt numb for a moment, and she shut her eyes. Then she murmured,

"Wherever Albus Dumbledore is, it's some sideways existence where I'm in love with Harry Potter and Ron's in love with Lavender Brown. And Sirius Black is happy and healthy, and the Weasley twins are together, creating mischief. I hope with all my heart that that somewhere is real. I hope it is true. I hope Sirius and Fred are alive somewhere."

"I suspect," said Tom, "that there are many, many real sideways places. Many threads of existence. Perhaps there's a place where you and I… where we…"

He trailed off, and Hermione opened her eyes. His face had gone red, and Hermione studied his handsome features. Tom cleared his throat a bit roughly, and he said,

"I just meant that perhaps, in one of those threads, you don't hate me."

"I don't hate you," Hermione said, realising at once that it was true. She blinked. She needed to hate him, didn't she? He was Tom Riddle. She was Hermione Granger. She needed to do everything she could to destroy him and what he would become, didn't she? But she didn't want to destroy the wizard before her. She wanted to kiss him, to touch him. She didn't hate him. She reached up to hold his face in her hands, and she shook her head, her eyes welling. She whispered, almost desperately, "I don't hate you."

"Perhaps," Tom said, his hands closing around Hermione's waist, "there's a thread somewhere, a place where you let me kiss you all the time and let me tell you that you're very pretty. Perhaps there's a place where you like it when I touch you."

Hermione blinked slowly. "Perhaps there is such a place."

Tom's fingers cinched at Hermione's waist and started to pull her mustard-coloured blouse out of her pleated skirt. His eyes bored into hers, glittering strangely. She realised he was silently asking permission to continue, and she just nodded. He reached up and unclasped her cloak, pushing it off of her shoulders and letting it fall to the ground. It pooled at her feet, and then he helped Hermione wriggle out of her blouse. He dropped it slowly, letting it slither out of his fingers and drop to the floor. Then he reached and cupped Hermione's breast through the thin cotton material of her white bra, and he whispered,

"A place where I tell you how pretty you are. You're very pretty."

"Tom." Hermione gulped. She felt his other hand slide around her back and fumble a little with the hook-and-eye clasp of her bra, which she'd made for herself. He wouldn't know that it wasn't expertly crafted, she thought. She shimmied out of the bra and dropped it, and he went back to caressing her chest. Her nipples began to peak, puckering as if it were chilly in the flat. His thumb pulled across a nipple, then circled around before his fingers compressed the tissue of her breast. Hermione let out a little noise of want, and she reached for his tie.

She loosened the tie beyond what he'd already done, and she slid it up and over his head. It joined the growing pile of her clothes on the ground, and then Hermione began to unbutton Tom's white shirt. Once she'd opened it, she pushed it away from his shoulders, and he shucked it. She flattened her palms and dragged them around the planes of his chest, over his flat stomach, and settled her touch on the buttons of his trousers. He had taken his belt off before she'd come, she saw now, and he was already barefoot. It didn't take long for the two of them to open his trousers and shove them down, and soon enough Tom was naked with his cock at full mast.

His hands went straight to the buttons along the side of Hermione's skirt, and he opened up the last garment concealing her body from him. She let him hook his thumbs in the waistband of her skirt and push it down with her knickers. She kicked them away, bending down to peel away her socks and kicking off her shoes. Now she was naked, too, and she stared at Tom as she found herself asking,

"Is this going to happen in the sitting room again?"

"Would you prefer a bed this time?" Tom asked, and Hermione smirked. She nodded, and Tom took her hand. He led her down a short corridor with a painting of red roses on the wall. At the end of the corridor was a small bedroom, and as they walked inside, Tom aimed his wand at the sconces on the wall to light them. The room was bathed in a warm light that revealed grey walls, crisp white trim, and a brass bed with a cosy-looking quilt. It was an oddly comfortable-looking space, and Hermione's stomach twisted strangely as she stepped inside.

_You are precisely where you ought to be,_ Professor Dumbledore had said. _He needs you there, the you that you are._

"Hermione," said Tom, and he took Hermione's hand again. He guided her toward the bed, and she could see that he was still fully erect. He pulled her near, and he brushed the tip of his wand against her lower abdomen as he bent down and kissed her lips softly. He murmured onto her mouth, "_Breviter Sterilitatem._"

Hermione felt the cool spread of the contraceptive charm in her body, and she was dizzy with desire all of a sudden. She watched Tom set down his wand on the bedside table, and Hermione crawled up onto the bed with him. She lay on her back, casting one arm up over her head. Her curls were splayed all over the pillow, but she could tell by the way Tom was looking down at her that she did actually find her pretty. He studied her, touching gently at her breast with one hand and her hip with the other. He leaned down and kissed her collarbone, making Hermione shiver, and he said against her skin,

"A place where you let me kiss you. A place where you like it when I touch you."

"Tom." Hermione held his head in her hands, tangling her fingers in his dark waves. Tom moved his kisses around Hermione's chest, down the softness of her breast until he latched onto a nipple. He suckled for a moment, and Hermione was reminded of the lurid novel she'd read about the Scottish witch and her ginger-haired lover. But she cried out and arched her back a little as Tom pulled her nipple into his mouth and lathed his tongue over it. She writhed on the bed, flushing very wet between her legs. She felt heat take her over, want rushing through her veins like fire. "Tom…"

He stared up at her as his mouth planted kisses all over her other breast. His hand went between their two bodies, and the instant his middle finger touched at her womanhood, Hermione tipped her head back. Tom let out a low grown, bringing his wet lips back up to her collarbone and kissing her there. His mouth dragged up her neck and then his lips were square on hers. He kissed Hermione for all he was worth then, drawing at her mouth with his. His teeth were rough against her lips, and his finger started to move between Hermione's legs. She spread her thighs a bit wider to give him better access. He traced around her entrance, spreading the wet heat that had flushed there. His middle finger and his forefinger slowly probed into Hermione's body, hooking and twisting, and his thumb pressed onto her clit. His mouth ripped from hers, his lips coming to rest beside her ear on the pillow. He panted and groaned again, and then he mumbled,

"I want to be in a place where you like it when I touch you."

"I like it," Hermione promised. She rubbed at his arms, then dragged her fingertips down his chest and turned her face. She kissed his cheek and moved one hand to his hair. She scratched gently at his scalp as his fingers twisted within her, as his thumb circled on her clit, and she wrenched her eyes shut. "I do like it when you touch me."

"Then you must let me kiss you and tell you that you're pretty," he huffed, "and I will be just where I ought to be."

"Tom." Hermione felt tears squeeze out of her eyes, and she mumbled, "I want you inside of me."

"Mmph." He moved around a little, his movements awkward and unpractised as he grasped his cock and lined his tip up with Hermione's entrance. He pushed into her body, and she curled one leg around his hip and kept one straight. When he started to thrust, the grinding felt so good that Hermione cried out again, and he asked a bit frantically,

"Does it hurt?"

"No. No. Don't stop." Hermione gripped his biceps and watched as he pushed himself up a little. He bucked his hips down and forward, pistoning into her so that his cock ground hard against her body. She was blinded, suddenly, by how good he felt within her. She gulped hard and tried to think straight, tried to form a coherent thought, but all she could do was stroke at his arms and tighten her leg around him. She used her other foot to rub at his calf, which he seemed to enjoy. Tom choked out a little noise and warned her,

"It's not going to last."

"That's fine," Hermione said breathlessly. She could feel her own climax barrelling at her like a steam engine, roaring forth with every thrust of Tom's body into hers. He bucked his hips a few more times, and then he started to speed up and pant a bit wildly. Hermione came so hard she actually lost her breath for a moment. Her hands flew to the sheets, her fingers sinking into the sheets and holding fast. She shut her eyes and let the pleasure wash over her as she realised she could feel Tom softening inside of her. He'd already finished, she thought, but he was still thrusting in a desperate attempt to bring Hermione to her own completion.

That, she thought distantly, was rather thoughtful of him.

It took her a very long moment to come down from the high of her climax, for the satisfaction had been intense and fulfilling. Tom finally slid out of her body and landed beside her on the bed with an '_oof.'_ His slick chest heaved, and Hermione felt his come leaking out between her legs and getting all over the covers. She pointed at his wand, and he grabbed for it, aiming it at their bodies and muttering spells to Siphon and Scour. He set the wand back down and started to peel back the blankets, encouraging Hermione to climb properly into bed with him. Hermione hesitated; wasn't it crossing some sort of line to cuddle with Tom Riddle?

She'd crossed all sorts of lines, she realised, and there was absolutely no going back. She was getting every signal imaginable that she wasn't even meant to go back from this. So she crawled under the blankets and sheets and curled one leg over Tom's hips. She put one arm across his chest and pulled herself up against his body, resting her face on his shoulder. She shut her eyes and breathed him in, and then she felt him kiss her forehead.

"You are very pretty," Tom murmured. "I mean to tell you all the time."

"I do like it when you touch me," Hermione said in return. Tom sighed and dusted his fingers over her arm, and he whispered,

"_You are precisely where you ought to be. He needs you there, the you that you are._"

"Rule Number One, Mr Riddle," Hermione scolded, but Tom reminded her,

"I am not very good at following rules, but I have no intention of attacking you, so I do at least promise to follow Rule Number Two."

"Things will be different this time," Hermione said. "They must be. Someone sent me here so that things would be different. My ring disappeared because I came here. Things changed, splintered, Vanished, and became new. But you're right. There are probably a great many threads of existence."

"Well," Tom said, "I like this one. I like this place where you let me kiss you and tell you that you're pretty. This place where you like it when I touch you."

_This place where I don't hate you,_ Hermione thought. She blinked, pulling her fingertips around his chest and saying quietly,

"You should get the Lestranges a sympathy gift. It would help endear them to you. You want loyalty from your old friends? You have to give them something. Odessa's lost a baby. Go to Floribunders Florist in the morning and arrange for something to be sent to St Mungo's for them."

She realised then that she'd just given advice to Tom Riddle, that she'd just tried to help him. She should feel cold and fearful at what she'd done, but instead she just curled up more tightly onto him and thought of what Dumbledore had said. She was where she was meant to be. Tom needed her, just the way she was. She thought of her Vanished engagement ring, of the photograph of her marrying Harry Potter. She thought of Crookshanks and of Porridge. She thought of Tom - of the taste and smell of him, of the feel of him. She shut her eyes, and she whispered,

"I do belong here, after all."

"Stay the night, will you?" Tom suggested, and Hermione responded by very swiftly falling asleep.

**Author's Note: Oh, my. They're both in deep, emotionally and physically. Dumbledore's message seems to mean that Hermione's purpose in going back to 1947 is to create a timeline where Tom Riddle doesn't turn into the Voldemort we're all familiar with. But she's already working to help him. What will happen next with his lackies? With the Ministry? Hmm…**

**As always, thank you so very much for reading and reviewing.**


	14. Chapter 14

In the morning, Hermione blinked open her eyes and touched at the sheets beside her.

"Ronald?" she whispered, for she'd been dreaming of him. In her dream, she and Ron had been dancing in a Muggle nightclub. Hermione had dragged Ron out on a Friday night, and she'd dolled herself up in the latest Muggle fashion - a silvery shirt with glitter eyeshadow and frosty lipstick. Ron had had absolutely no idea how to move to the thudding, electronic music. The memory had reverberated through Hermione's mind until she'd awoken.

Now she lay on Tom's bed, staring at the blank spot next to her, and panic struck her through. When she'd first awakened in this time, Ron had been missing from the bed beside her. Hermione gulped and sat bolt upright in bed, calling out loudly,

"Tom!"

Suddenly a dark wooden door opened, and Tom Riddle appeared, naked except for a towel around his waist. His dark hair was wet, Hermione could see. He'd showered, obviously. He raised his eyebrows at Hermione and informed her,

"Wanted to let you sleep as long as I could."

Hermione shut her eyes and wondered if there was still a thread, a place, where Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger were in love. She buried her face in her hands and then looked up to see that Tom was giving her an odd look. She knew why. They'd spent the night together, completely naked. She'd fallen asleep curled up against his warm body, and she'd slumbered soundly with him. He'd woken and showered, and now she was acting like she was filled with regret. She wasn't, of course. She was just confused, the way she'd been confused since arriving in this time. She cleared her throat and said,

"I'm going back to my flat to dress for the day. I have to feed Porridge and give her fresh water."

"Of course," Tom said lightly. "I think I'm going to take your advice and go to the florist's. I'll have something sent to St Mungo's straight away for Odessa. Or to the Lestranges' home. Whichever you think is best."

"To the hospital. If she's been discharged, they'll send it to her house," Hermione said. She nodded and told Tom, "Reynard won't forget that you were sympathetic in their time of grief. He'll be especially loyal to you."

Tom leaned against the frame of the bathroom doorway. "And you have a vested interest now in whether or not my old friends are loyal to me?"

"I…" Hermione licked her lips. "Dumbledore said that I'm meant to be here, and that you need me just the way I am. You've promised that things are going to be different this time around. I suppose that means we ought to at least try to be friendly, you and I."

"Friendly." Tom smirked a little and studied the messy bed. "Yes. Things did feel rather… _friendly_… last night."

Hermione's cheeks went hot. She climbed out of the bed, still naked but somehow unashamed to let Tom see her that way. Her clothes were in a pile in the sitting room, she knew. She strode rather confidently out of the bedroom and went out to the little parlour, where she began to dress, pulling on her knickers and bra. Tom followed her out there, still wearing nothing but a towel, and said,

"I was invited, a long time ago, to the wedding of Aberdeen Nott and Gavin Mulciber. It's this weekend. I wonder if you'd attend with me."

Hermione smirked a bit as she pulled on her mustard-coloured blouse and said,

"I'll have to keep getting creative with Transfiguration spells if I want to be presentable at all these formal events."

"Is that a _yes?_" Tom asked, and Hermione raised her eyes to see that he actually seemed a bit anxious. She chewed her lip and shrugged.

"Yes. I'll go in there on your arm, just like I did to the dinner party at Malfoy Manor."

"That was different," Tom pointed out. "You were invited separately to the dinner party. And I brought you to Cygnus' birthday party as something of a curiosity. This is, I confess, an unabashed date."

Hermione let out a shaking breath then and nodded. "Yes. All right."

Tom curled up his lips. "Go feed your cat," he said, "and change your clothes. I've got flowers to send to an aggrieved old friend, and then I'll see you at the shop."

* * *

Hermione had no idea what Pureblood snobs wore to weddings in the 1940s, so she could only hope that what she'd done to her mint green silk gown tonight was a passable impression of respectable fashion.

She'd taken the long sleeves and shortened them until there was nothing left; this gown was an off-the-shoulder creation meant for balls. Hermione had Transfigured the mint green silk into crimson and black, and she'd Conjured scarlet roses out of silk as accents. She'd added layers to the skirts to make them fuller until they swished and swayed when she moved. The gown was truly a work of evening wonder now, a darker and more mysterious look than anything Hermione had tried so far. She'd put on her little pearl pendant and had drawn her honey-coloured hair up into a curly updo. She'd put beautification creme on her face, and she'd used a Charm to darken her lips, eyes, and cheeks a bit further.

Now she walked through the Leaky Cauldron, wearing her winter cloak over her formal gown and keeping her head down, and emerging out into Charing Cross Road. She hurried down the sidewalk, but as she passed a Muggle man in a suit, he enquired,

"Off to the ball, Cinderella?"

Hermione didn't answer him. She just rushed along determinedly, wishing that she had the ability to Apparate in this time. She felt hobbled, like she was fifteen years old again. She finally reached Number 23, and when she pushed open the door, she climbed the stairs as quickly as her low black heels would allow. She panted as she reached the second floor, and by the time she knocked on the door for flat 2B, she was breathless. Hermione peeled back the hood of her cloak and smoothed her curls as she waited for the door to open. When at last it did, she was utterly taken aback.

He looked so very formal, she thought. Tom Riddle was wearing a full set of solemn tuxedo robes, complete with a crisp white bow tie and matching white waistcoat. His small black buttons gleamed, and the cut of his tuxedo robe was fitted and perfect. His hair had been quite carefully styled with a side part and some Sleekeazy's, and he'd obviously put a good deal of effort into shaving his face flawlessly. He stared at Hermione, and he blinked, and he murmured,

"You look wonderful."

"I was just about to say the same to you," Hermione smiled. She followed him into his flat, and he cleared his throat carefully. He shut the door and told Hermione,

"You can leave your cloak here, if you'd like. You won't be needing it. We're going by Floo straight into Nott Castle."

"Oh. Of course." Hermione unclasped her cloak and peeled it off, laying it down upon the divan in Tom's sitting room. Suddenly he was ogling her without shame, and she felt rather self-conscious. She dragged her palms down her torso and asked, "Is it too much?"

"It's…" Tom shook his head. "You look wonderful."

Hermione quirked up her lips a little and joked, "It's just going to get dusty and destroyed in the Floo Network, so."

"I shall clean you off, then," Tom told her. Hermione huffed a breath. Over the last few days, he'd been quiet. She knew why. The Ministry of Magic had been vocal, in the _Daily Prophet_ and even in issued pamphlets, about the urgency of figuring out what had happened to Albus Dumbledore. His case was now being treated as a murder; people were beginning to assume he was dead. Nothing would ever get traced back to Tom, of course, but there had been that letter Brendan Duncan had found from Dumbledore to Hermione. Tom had worked hard to redirect Duncan's mind away from suspicion of Hermione. He'd had forgeries planted. He'd altered the memory of Garrick Ollivander. But there was still the fact that very few people had any idea who Hermione really was. Tom had told Hermione that it was important for her to carve out a footprint in this new timeline, to forge new alliances and make new connections so that her bond with _the community_ was stronger. It would be more difficult for the Ministry to suspect her of anything odd if she had already blended into Tom's group, he said. Hermione could only hope Tom was right.

As for that group of friends, it had seemed that Tom's gift to the grieving Lestranges had been greatly appreciated. Neither Reynard nor Odessa would be at the wedding tonight, but Reynard had come into Borgin and Burkes the day before to personally tell Tom that the elaborate bouquet he'd sent to St Mungo's had lifted Odessa's spirits a bit. _If there's ever anything you need, Tom,_ Reynard Lestrange had said, _I hope you know you can count on me._

So Hermione knew that she was in deep with Tom Riddle now. She was more than his colleague, and more than the witch who had snogged him and slept in his bed. She was something of an ally to him - something she had never, ever expected to be. Now she stood with him in his sitting room and prepared to go to a wedding with him on what he'd declared to be a certifiable date. She wondered, rather distantly, just how much he would let the others see of that. How obvious would he let it be to his old friends that he and Hermione were more than just coworkers who quite liked to touch one another? How blatantly would he show them that things had devolved into a puddle of madness where he bought Hermione pets and she saw him fresh out of a shower?

Before Hermione could think too much more on the matter, Tom was walking over to his fireplace. He opened his cut crystal container on his mantle and opened it, taking a fistful of Floo Powder. He wedged his way into the fireplace, tossed down the Floo Powder, and exclaimed,

"_NOTT CASTLE, HAMPSHIRE!"_

Hermione watched green flames erupt around Tom, and he vanished into the light. Hermione shielded her vision from the bright green explosion, and once it had faded, she stepped up to the contained of Floo Powder and took a fistful. She shut the container and wormed her way into the fireplace. She threw the handful of Floo Powder and yelled in a clear, loud voice,

"_NOTT CASTLE! HAMPSHIRE!_"

Emerald fire licked at her at once, cool and vacuous as she was pulled into a swirling black abyss of travel. She warped into nothingness for a brief instant and then felt herself being tossed forward. She stumbled and coughed, staggering out a large fireplace in an unfamiliar place. She looked around to see that she was in a somewhat obnoxiously decorated room. The walls were a sickly pink, and the curtains and furniture were olive green. Hermione frowned, turning to Tom as she asked,

"How bad is the soot?"

"Not so very bad," he shrugged. He swept his wand from her hair down her body lengthwise and said quietly, "_Scourgify_ _Trio._"

"Is my hair…?" Hermione reached up to touch at her curls, but Tom just sighed and assured her,

"You look wonderful."

"Where do you suppose the wedding is?" Hermione asked, and Tom glanced over his shoulder toward the sound of tinkling glass and distant laughter.

"That way, I think," he said. He reached for Hermione's hand, and she hesitated for just a moment before slipping her fingers through his and walking out of the garish pink and green room with him. They went out into a corridor with arched stone ceilings and beautiful tapestries on the walls, and Hermione noted,

"Lovely castle they've got here."

"The Notts are old money." Tom pursed his lips. Hermione knew what he was thinking. He'd like to have some of the Nott fortune for himself. His old friend, the one Tom just kept referring to as _Nott,_ had a name, surely. She cleared his throat and asked,

"What's he called? The one with the curls who went to school with you?"

"Oh. Canon. The one who's always mingling about with Avery is Canon Nott."

Hermione stopped walking and giggled. Tom scowled at her. Hermione shook her head and shrugged, repeating in disbelief,

"_Canon Nott?_ As in, he can not? Cannot? Canon Nott? That may very well be the most unfortunate name I have ever heard in my entire life."

Tom raised a brow. "Why do you think I just call him _Nott?_"

"Poor man," Hermione laughed as she and Tom walked down the corridor, and Tom scoffed,

"Yes. Poor little rich man."

He sounded a little bitter then, so Hermione decided to let the matter drop. She and Tom walked into a rather extravagant ballroom that had been set up for a grand occasion. There were round tables set up on one side of the ballroom, and a space with a small orchestra of musicians and a dance floor on the other. In the centre of the ballroom, against one stone wall, was a raised platform with banners behind it reading _Nott_ and _Mulciber._

"Mr Riddle and… guest," said a wizard Hermione didn't recognise, a young, skinny man. "May I get you a drink?"

"I'll take a firewhisky, Darwin. How about you, Miss Granger?" Tom flashed Hermione a small smile, and she felt a wash of confusion as she was suddenly taken back to Neville Longbottom playing waiter at the Slug Club parties in her sixth year. She nodded and said,

"A… a glass of red wine, if you please?"

"Of course. Just a moment."

The wizard walked off, and Hermione gave Tom a questioning glance. Tom shrugged.

"One of the more distant and less prestigious Shacklebolts. He was always too fearful at school to join in any of the mischief my friends and I got into, and he didn't have any ambition after we graduated. As far as I know, he's not up to anything impressive these days. But the House-Elves can't handle everything."

"Nor should they," Hermione said quite indignantly. Tom nodded.

"Right. S.P.E.W."

She flinched then, because he'd actually said the letters separately instead of mocking her organisation by calling it "Spew." Hermione cleared her throat a bit and pushed,

"House-Elves don't deserve all the abuse they receive. Just because they aren't witches and wizards doesn't mean they should be kicked about or whipped into submission, you understand."

"I admit that I have never given much thought to the welfare of elves," Tom said, "but you're probably right about it, so."

Hermione's mouth fell open. She watched a sorrowful-looking House-Elf go toddling by with a tray full of puff pastry. The elf offered the food to a cluster of guests, and one of the Purebloods attending the wedding snarled something at the House-Elf. It winced and nodded, turning away.

"Pardon me," Tom said lightly, and the elf rushed over, almost dropping the tray.

"Yes, sir. How may Coaky be of assistance, sir?" The elf bowed its head. Tom flicked his eyes to Hermione and then asked,

"What sort of food is this?"

The elf raised its enormous blue eyes and said, "These are spiced sausage puffs, sir. Would sir like a sausage puff, sir? Miss?"

"Thank you." Hermione plucked one of the hors d'oeuvres off of the tray, and Tom did the same. He nodded down at the House-Elf and said,

"Thank you."

The House-Elf bowed so low that it almost dropped its tray again, and then it skittered off. Hermione stared at Tom for a long moment, but he looked away. Darwin, the Shacklebolt boy who had taken their drink orders, came walking back up with a tumbler of firewhisky and a glass of red wine. He handed them over to Hermione and Tom and said,

"Here you are. Enjoy the wedding."

The wedding, as it turned out, began almost immediately. Hermione and Tom took their drinks and moved with the crowd to gather around as Aberdeen Nott's father walked the pretty auburn-haired witch up the short aisle to the waiting Mulciber boy. Hermione leaned over to Tom and whispered,

"It seems like they are quite in love with one another. Look at how she smiles at him."

"Hmm." Tom did not seem as affected by the romance as Hermione was. He flicked his eyes up and down Hermione's form and sipped at his firewhisky as the ancient Travers wizard officiating droned on. _Marriage is the binding of hearts and souls,_ the officiant was saying. _In marriage, two become one. _

This all felt deeply familiar. Hermione had been a bridesmaid in her cousin's wedding, when she'd been a little girl. It had been a Muggle wedding, of course. She'd been nine years old, and she'd gotten to wear a frilly dress that had had pink flowers all over it. She blinked, remembering the wedding cake and the way her cousin had danced with her new husband whilst her family had dabbed at tears and taken photographs. That was all gone now, Hermione thought. That world was somewhere she couldn't reach.

She felt Tom reach for her fingers, and she knew he was in her mind. Somehow, she couldn't be angry about that right now. Somehow she couldn't be cross with him for feeling the pulse of what had already passed for her, what would never be again. She watched as the old Travers wizard bound a magical silver ribbon around the clasped hands of Aberdeen Nott and Gavin Mulciber. She listened as the Purebloods sang a traditional old celebratory song that Hermione did not know. She had heard it once before, at Fleur Delacour's wedding to Bill Weasley. It was a wizarding folk tune sung at weddings, not a Pureblood anthem, but it still made her feel a little alienated as a Muggle-born. For some reason, the Muggle-born Brit in her wanted to break out into a rousing chorus of "Jerusalem" just to confuse all the Blood Purists in the room.

Aberdeen and Gavin kissed, and the silver ribbon from their handfasting dissolved into the air, having linked them together in the ceremony. The orchestra in the corner began to play a lively tune to proclaim the joy of the new marriage, and then people slowly scattered. Hermione and Tom searched the round tables until at last Tom said,

"We're right here."

Hermione moved beside him and saw that there was a neat little rectangle of parchment with metallic gold and black writing on one plate. _Mr Tom Riddle_, it read. On the plate beside it, another card read, _Miss Hermione Granger._

Hermione picked up the card and looked at Tom. "How did they know my name."

"I told Mulciber I was bringing you," Tom said simply. Hermione felt a swell of something rather strange inside her chest, and her breath quickened a little in her throat. Tom pulled out her chair for her, and Hermione swept to sit down. Her skirts billowed around her, and suddenly a voice from beside her said,

"My goodness. Miss Granger, if you aren't the most beautiful witch in the room tonight. And that includes the bride. Don't tell Aberdeen I said that, of course."

Hermione looked up to see Druella Rosier standing before Hermione in elegant plum dress robes. She and Cygnus Black III sat in the seats beside Hermione, and Druella gushed,

"I love weddings. Don't you?"

"I think you're just saying that because you're looking forward to _our_ wedding, Druella," scolded Cygnus from beside her. Druella swatted at his arm, but Druella rolled her eyes. Hermione smiled a little and asked,

"Has he come round yet on the matter of the pink peonies?"

"Oh, yes. That's all settled. Isn't it, Cygnus?" Druella laughed a little, and Hermione realised she was actually joking, being lighthearted, with the people who would birth and raise Draco Malfoy's mother, along with Bellatrix Lestrange. She shut her eyes and tried to right herself, tried to remind herself that she wasn't a wicked person.

"Nott and Avery. Are you one another's dates?" she heard Tom tease. She opened her eyes to see that gangly Avery and the very unfortunately named Canon Nott - brother of the bride - had taken seats beside Tom. They both let out nervous laughs and admitted,

"Neither of us could manage to get witches to come with us. We tried, but… you know," Avery shrugged.

"Perhaps you'll have better luck for our wedding," Druella Rosier said happily. Abraxas Malfoy walked up then, and on his arm was Druella's pretty sister, Priscilla Rosier.

"Look, Malfoy's managed a date," Nott grumbled, and Druella bragged,

"And he's done quite well for himself. A good Rosier girl. Of course, as I said, I think Miss Granger is the finest-dressed witch at the table. Don't you agree, Priscilla?"

"The red silk is stunning," said Priscilla in a prim sort of voice. Bellatrix couldn't help noticing that Druella had warmed considerably to her, and she wondered whether that had anything to do with the fact that she was so obviously now _with_ Tom Riddle. After all, Cygnus Black III and Druella Rosier were obviously aspirational when it came to Tom. It made sense that Druella Rosier would set aside her Blood Purism more easily than Walburga Black, for example, for the sake of making the right connections.

"You're too kind," Hermione said. "It's all spellwork."

"Is it _really?_" Druella marvelled. Tom cleared his throat and said,

"I told you all that Hermione was an exceptionally skilled witch. I was telling the truth about that. She is remarkably gifted with magic, all of it self-taught. She's a marvel."

"Avery, catch him; the man's swooning," teased Cygnus Black, but Tom put his lips into a line and looked at Hermione seriously.

"I am, a little."

There was quiet at the table then, and finally Priscilla Rosier demanded,

"It's quite warm in here, isn't it?"

Before anyone could answer, the glasses around the ballroom clinked with a spell to get everyone's attention. Mr Nott gave a toast to thank everyone for coming to the wedding, to Nott Castle, and to wish his daughter Aberdeen a lifetime of happiness with Gavin Mulciber. Then Aberdeen's best friend from school and Gavin's younger brother gave short little speeches about how wonderful the bride and groom were, how perfectly suited they were for one another, and how they were going to have a swarm of children within five years. Gavin and Aberdeen went out to the dance floor and meandered their way through a short two-step, and then people were allowed to eat.

The meal was simple - pumpkin soup with roast chicken and potato. As Hermione sat eating, Nott and Avery discussed Quidditch with Abraxas Malfoy. Apparently, a player had recently died in a match after falling from his broom and breaking his neck. It had made the headlines of the _Daily Prophet_ for only one day, because everyone was still so caught up in Dumbledore's disappearance. But in the sporting world, the death of Ballycastle Bats Chaser Basil Lovegood was big news. Hermione flinched at the mention of the player's name, and she asked,

"Lovegood, you said? Basil Lovegood?"

"Yes." Avery nodded. "Damned shame. His brother died in the conflict with Grindelwald, and Basil Lovegood had just been married to a fan of his, some pretty girl from Ottery St Catchpole."

Hermione froze. She wondered whether Basil Lovegood, this Chaser who had been killed in a freak Quidditch accident, could have been the intended father of Xenophilius Lovegood, Luna's father. Had this been another Un-Birth? Was this another consequence of her time travel? Or was is merely another shred of evidence that she was _somewhere else,_ that this sideways existence didn't fulfil all the expectations she had of the world she'd left behind? Realising she'd been sitting and staring into her bowl of pumpkin soup, Hermione finally said thoughtfully,

"Well, that's too bad… that he fell and broke his neck like that."

"Not to change the subject, but I wanted to let you know, Tom," said Cygnus Black from Hermione's right. "I've been promoted within my department. I manage six people now."

"Wondrous." Tom curled his lips up. "Keep climbing, Cygnus. You never know when it will be exceedingly beneficial to be in a position of authority, hmm?"

"Quite so." Cygnus grinned. Priscilla Rosier cleared her throat a bit and announced,

"I'm off to Paris next week. I'm going to spend a few months in France. It's like home to me, really."

Druella let out an irritated huff. "Right before my wedding."

Abraxas Malfoy looked mildly hurt. "I didn't know you were going to France, Priscilla."

Tom dabbed his napkin at his lips. Priscilla looked a bit surprised by the negative feedback to her news. She shrugged and sipped her wine.

"I feel far more comfortable in France than I've ever felt in Britain."

"Then perhaps you ought to just move there," Druella snapped.

"Perhaps I shall," Priscilla replied.

"Druella, if you've finished eating, I'd like to dance," Cygnus suggested. Druella scowled but let him take her hand, and the two of them walked away from the table. Nott coughed into his hand and joked,

"Want to dance, Avery?"

"You know I've got two left feet and a penchant for sneaking kisses from my dance partner," Avery simpered back, and everyone laughed a little, even Tom. Hermione pushed herself up to stand, her skirts billowing around her. She walked over to where Avery sat, and she put her hand on his shoulder,

"Mr Avery," she said warmly, "so long as you don't sneak any kisses and you promise not to trod on my foot, I would be honoured by a dance."

The table went a bit quiet then, and Avery's face pinked. He looked at Tom, whose lips pursed and whose cheeks went scarlet red. But Tom cleared his throat and said lightly,

"Do be careful not to step on her, Avery."

Avery rose to stand with Hermione, and she let him lead her out toward the dance floor. Hermione suddenly realised that this wizard would grow into a Death Eater, at least in the world she had left behind. What on Earth would Ron Weasley and Harry Potter think of her, walking arm-in-arm with a would-be Death Eater out onto a dance floor?

But this wasn't the world she'd left behind. This was somewhere else entirely. This was a different thread. A different place.

Hermione smiled warmly at Avery as he put one hand carefully on her waist and held loosely onto her other hand. She curled her fingers around the shoulder of his dress robes and began to sway with him to the waltz the orchestra had struck up. Avery struggled with the steps, so Hermione rather took the lead, guiding their motions as Avery gave her a grateful look and managed to say,

"Mr Riddle is a lucky man."

"He's… he and I aren't…" Hermione struggled to articulate anything. Were she and Tom a couple? She wasn't even certain how to answer that question to herself, much less to Avery. What was Tom to her? What was she to Tom. "_Ow._"

"Oh. I do apologise." Avery had stepped right on Hermione's foot, and she frowned a little as she cleared her throat. She forced a smile and shook her head.

"It's fine. Tom and I are still just feeling things out, you understand. It's all very new."

"I see." Avery's eyes glistened a little. "He's going to be a very influential man, I believe."

"Do you think so?" Hermione struggled to keep Avery centred in the waltz. She forced another smile and said, "I do think he's going to do some very significant things. I can only hope that those things are… that, you know, everything turns out for the best."

She was being cryptic, she thought, and probably confusing Avery. Sure enough, the wizard's brows furrowed. The waltz ended, thankfully. Hermione stepped back and dipped a little, and Avery gave her a little bow. Suddenly a figure appeared beside Avery - Tom Riddle himself.

"May I have the next dance, Miss Granger?" Tom asked, and Hermione gave him a shy little smile. She nodded and said,

"Thank you, Mr Avery."

"Sorry," he mumbled in return, "for trodding on your foot."

He hurried away, and Hermione let Tom pull her into a dancing stance as she noted,

"It's a little different this time. Last time we danced, I believe I was barefoot in a Knockturn Alley flat and we still didn't like one another very much."

She remembered then what he'd said when he'd danced with her then - that he'd been dancing with someone else's witch. She'd belonged to Ron Weasley, Tom had said, and Ron had belonged to Hermione. But, somehow, that all felt very far away now. It wasn't that she didn't love Ron anymore. She did. If she woke up tomorrow and Ron was in bed beside her, she'd kiss him and hold him and be elated to see him. But she'd wonder where Porridge had gone, and she'd miss Tom.

She was a witch of two worlds now. Tom had said that, too.

"I'm breaking Rule Number One," Tom warned her as they swayed. "I'm in your head."

"I know," Hermione murmured, staring up at him. "I'm starting to get better at feeling the little push when you invade my thoughts."

"You don't scold me as often about it as you used to," Tom noted. Hermione shrugged and said helplessly,

"I don't feel much like hiding anymore."

"Druella Rosier is quite impressed by your Transfiguration abilities," Tom said. Hermione wanted to snap that she didn't give a damn what the mother of Bellatrix Black thought about anything, but instead she just found herself saying,

"I'm glad I went back to school to finish my N.E.W.T.s. after the war was won. Harry and Ron… they didn't go back to school. I am proud to say that I'm educated."

"But in this existence, you never went to Hogwarts," Tom pointed out as they kept moving. "Here, you're self-taught."

Hermione laughed a little and rolled her eyes. "Even in my world, Tom, I was mostly self-taught. I practically lived in the library. Do you know they called me The Brightest Witch of My Age?"

"And so modest, too," Tom teased her. He tipped his head. "They used to tell me how intelligent I was, too."

"I know." Hermione nodded. "Funny, that neither of us were Sorted in Ravenclaw."

"You were entirely too brazen and fearless and tenacious to be a Ravenclaw," Tom said coolly, "and I was entirely too ambitious and manipulative."

"Am I still tenacious?" Hermione worried. She stared up at him and shook her head. "I feel a little lost, like some of my bravery's gone."

"Don't worry," Tom whispered. "You're still a Gryffindor."

"Why were you kind to that House-Elf?" Hermione demanded. "Earlier, you thanked the House-Elf. Why?"

"Because," he said, "I think you are correct that it is unreasonable to treat them with unnecessary cruelty. And because S.P.E.W. mattered to you. Quite a lot, from what I can tell, though it does not seem to have mattered much to anybody else."

The song ended, but Hermione did not let go of Tom. She stared up at him and told him,

"Avery says you're going to be influential. I told him I agreed. Cygnus Black was bragging to you about his promotion. You're going to start gaining real followers. I want you to promise me that things are going to be different from how I learnt your life story -"

"I've promised you," Tom said calmly, rubbing his thumb over Hermione's, "that this thread will be very different."

Hermione thought of her Vanished engagement ring, of Porridge, of the photograph Dumbledore had sent through time and space. She thought of Odessa Lestrange's stillbirth, of Basil Lovegood dying in a Quidditch accident. Things were different.

Tom moved his hands to Hermione's cheeks, and suddenly she realised he was holding onto her face in front of everybody. There would be eyes on them, she thought. She pressed her hands to the front of his tuxedo robes, her eyes wide and questioning as she searched his gaze. He shut his own eyes and bent down, touching his lips to Hermione's for just a moment. Then he released her and said softly,

"Come. Almost time for cake."

**Author's Note: Whew! That chapter ran away from me a ****little bit****. Sorry, guys. Thanks as always for reading and reviewing. **


	15. Chapter 15

The next morning, a Sunday, was so unseasonably pleasant that Hermione spent only a half hour curled up with Porridge in bed before showering and dressing in a dark blue skirt and matching jumper. She pulled her waves back into a low ponytail and pulled on her cloak, and after feeding Porridge, she left the flat. She decided to make her way out to Diagon Alley for a late breakfast at the Leaky Cauldron, owing to the wondrous weather. The sun shone merrily upon the cobblestones, and Hermione felt a little bounce in her step as she walked from Knockturn Alley up to Diagon Alley.

But she frowned a little as she heard a ruckus to her left, and she realised there was a queue out the front door of Flourish and Blotts. Overcome with curiosity, Hermione changed course away from the Leaky Cauldron and began walking toward the bookshop. She tipped her head, taken back to the time when Gilderoy Lockhart had been signing books and Molly Weasley had been swooning. That felt like ages ago now, and a universe away.

"Miss Granger," said a breathless voice, and Hermione looked up to see Nathal Goshawk walking beside her. She smiled shyly at him and asked,

"Have you got any notion what this great fuss is about?"

"Why, it's Bathilda Bagshot, of course," Nathal said. "The magical historian."

"I know who she is," Hermione said, just a tad defensively. Her mouth fell open, and she breathed, "Of course. _A History of Magic._"

The book, which Hermione had read end-to-end multiple times along with having it assigned as a textbook by Professor Binns, had been published in 1947. Hermione marveled at the little crowd that had formed inside Flourish and Blotts, the queue that had bled out into Diagon Alley. This was very much like the incident with Gilderoy Lockhart.

"Is she in there signing copies?" Hermione asked. "Bathilda Bagshot?"

"She was scheduled to be, yes." Nathal smiled a bit, tossing back his tight ringlets. "I'd love to tell her how much I adored her book on the history of magical participation in Muggle wars. It felt so timely, being released last year."

"Oh. _In Smoke and Shadow._ By far her most esoteric historical work," Hermione noted. "I do think she was deeply affected by the intersection of the conflict with Grindelwald and the second Muggle world war."

"I think we all were," Nathal huffed, pinching his lips. Hermione just nodded. She hadn't lived those wars. She'd read about them. She'd lived her own wars, but not the ones the people here had known. She hadn't witnessed the news of Dumbledore defeating Grindelwald in the greatest duel in history, while simultaneously news poured in of Muggles dropping bombs on one another and killing hundreds of thousands in an instant. It was almost too much to calibrate.

Hermione got into the queue with Nathal, and as they slowly inched forward, Hermione mumbled,

"I'm going to wind up spending all of my money on this damned book."

"Sorry?" Nathal Goshawk asked politely, and Hermione just grinned and shook her head as she pulled out two Galleons from her drawstring bag.

"Nothing."

They were finally shooed into Flourish and Blotts then, and as they passed the counter, Hermione and Nathal were permitted to each purchase one copy of _A History of Magic_ so that they could proceed to the table at the back where Bathilda Bagshot was signing copies. Hermione paid for her book, then stared at it and was flooded with memories. She remembered reading it at her parents' house before the start of her first year at Hogwarts, so that she would have some clue of what world she was entering. She remembered reading it again for assignments for Professor Binns. She remembered taking it with her on the hunt for the Horcruxes and referencing it.

"Move up, girl!" said a wizard gruffly, and Hermione looked over her shoulder to apologise. It was the red-haired wizard who always delivered the _Daily Prophet_ to Borgin and Burkes. She ought to know his name, she thought distantly. If she was going to stay here, she should know people's names.

"Sorry, Mister…?"

"Weasley," the red-haired wizard said back, and Hermione froze. She was staring, she knew, searching his face. Suddenly she saw Arthur Weasley's eyes, his nose and his jawline. A father? She turned around again and shuffled forward, gulping hard.

"I really was so fascinated by your examination of how the magical and Muggle worlds have interplayed when it comes to conflict," Nathal Goshawk was telling Bathilda Bagshot now. Hermione peered around Nathal to see that Bathilda was nodding up at him, a quill in her hand.

"During what the Muggles call The Great War," she was telling Nathal, "Gellert Grindelwald first began to seize on the surrounding uncertainty. It is in times of Muggle instability that the wizarding world begins to unravel in its own cohesiveness."

"Thank you so much for your work as our preeminent historian," said Nathal Goshawk, wonder in his voice. "I'd be honoured if you'd sign my book."

"Of course." Bathilda put her quill to the inside of Nathal's book. "You're Boris Goshawk's boy, aren't you? Ethan?"

"Oh. Erm… Ethan is my brother. I'm Nathal."

"Right. _To Nathal, thank you for your keen interest in wizarding history. Warm regards, Bathilda Bagshot._" The magical historian handed Nathal his copy of _A History of Magic_, and Nathal bowed before walking past Hermione and saying happily,

"Good day, Miss Granger."

"See you, Mr Goshawk."

Hermione stepped up to the desk where Bathilda Bagshot was sitting, and cold flushed through her veins.

Suddenly she could see it all again - the way Voldemort had reanimated Bathilda Bagshot's murdered corpse and put Nagini into it. Suddenly Hermione could see Bathilda's body erupting into the snake again. She could hear people calling Bathilda 'batty' in the wake of Dumbledore's death, after Rita Skeeter had used Veritaserum to interrogate Bagshot about Dumbledore and Grindelwald, about Albus Dumbledore's early life.

Hermione just blinked as she stared down at Bathilda Bagshot. She set her book down, and the white-haired witch smiled up at her. She adjusted her hold on her quill and said,

"Good morning, dear."

"Good morning." Hermione felt numb all of a sudden. She tried to think of Ron, to think of Harry. She tried to tell herself that it had been Tom Riddle who had been responsible for Bathilda Bagshot winding up a reanimated corpse with a Horcrux of a snake inside of her. But, of course, it hadn't been the Tom Riddle that she knew here. It had been Lord Voldemort - the old, destroyed, vicious Lord Voldemort whom Hermione had battled. Things were different here.

Weren't they?

"Have you an interest in history?" asked Bathilda Bagshot kindly, and Hermione cleared her throat.

"I've read every single one of your books," she said. "I'm a devoted student of your work. I… look forward to reading this comprehensive new text."

"Oh! Quite so. To whom shall I make the inscription?" asked Bathilda, and Hermione shut her eyes as she said quietly,

"My name is Hermione Granger."

"What a lovely name," said Bathilda. "Are you familiar with the Muggle William Shakespeare? He used the name in his play _The Winter's Tale._"

Hermione's lips parted, and she nodded. "Hermione secluded herself for sixteen years without caring what her absence did to the memory of those she left behind. It was, perhaps, a striking coldness in such an otherwise tender and dignified character."

Bathilda's face softened. "My, but you _are_ studious, aren't you? Here. I shall sign your book; there are so many waiting. _To Hermione, who perhaps awaits the fulfilment of the oracle like her Shakespearean namesake. Yours in the study of a great many subjects, Bathilda Bagshot._"

"Thank you very kindly, Professor Bagshot." Hermione took the book, and Bathilda just smiled again. Hermione hurried away from the little table, out through the crowded shop and into the sunny street. She clutched her book, shutting her eyes and thinking of that night in Godric's Hollow with Harry when she'd seen old Bathilda's rotting body. She thought of the way she and Harry had clung to one another in fear and uncertainty. That had all been Voldemort's doing, she thought.

But the Tom Riddle she knew here was someone else. This Tom, _her_ Tom, was a different person entirely from the monster who had created Inferi and sent Nagini into the murdered historian's form. He was not the same. This thread was not the same.

She felt compelled to reassure herself of that, and she walked very quickly toward The Leaky Cauldron. She decided that, at least for now, she wasn't hungry, and she hustled through the pub and out onto Charing Cross Road. She walked down the sidewalk with her copy of _A History of Magic _held fast to her chest, and she kept her steps brisk as she approached Number 23. When at last she opened the door to Tom's building, she squealed and recoiled as the Puffskein who lived on the first floor went skittering underfoot. Hermione shook her head, shut the door, and pattered up the stairs.

On the second floor, she knocked on his door and waited for an answer. She pinched her lips and cleared her throat roughly, wondering just how exactly she was meant to confront Tom over this. What was she going to say to him? _Promise me you're not going to be the murderous beast I remember you being. Vow to me that you won't do those ghastly things._

"Miss Granger."

She turned around, confused at the sound of her name, and saw that skinny Avery and plump Canon Nott were ascending the stairs onto the second landing. She opened her mouth to ask them what they were doing there, but then the door behind her opened, and she heard Tom Riddle's voice say,

"Am I hosting a party that I didn't know about?"

"I…" Hermione whirled to face Tom. She panicked, holding out her book, and said, "I got a new book. I was excited about it and wanted to show you."

"Oh. A history book." He gave her a suspicious look, and she knew why. If this book had been published in 1947, and had been written by the famous Bathilda Bagshot, then surely Hermione had read it many times over by the year 2000. He knew there was another reason why Hermione was here. He flicked his eyes up to Nott and Avery and asked, "What are you two doing here on a Sunday… what time is it?"

"Nearly noon," Nott said with a little cough. "We came to see if you'd be interested in listening to the Quidditch match that starts in fifteen minutes. Appleby Arrows and the Kenmare Kestrels. We thought perhaps…"

He trailed off, but Hermione knew exactly what Nott had wanted. He and Avery wanted to be closer to Tom again, like they'd been in school. They wanted to be his friends. They wanted him to like them. She flashed Tom a look and gave him a minute little nod. Tom curled up his lips and said,

"Do you know, I went to the Pepper Pot for groceries earlier this morning. I'll whip us all up a quick lunch, and we'll listen to the match. Hermione, I'd like to hear about that book of yours."

He left the door open and stepped into his flat, and Hermione followed him inside. She thought hard at him then, and she felt the push of his Legilimency in her mind. She let terrible thoughts fly behind her eyes. She showed him Bathilda Bagshot's reanimated corpse with Nagini's Horcrux inside. She showed him the way people had spoken about Bagshot after Dumbledore's death. She showed him all of that, and then showed him Bagshot at the book signing this morning.

"My," Tom murmured, walking into his little kitchen and rolling up the sleeves of his white shirt, "that is fascinating."

Nott and Avery had gone into the sitting room and were adjusting the Wizarding Wireless. Hermione frowned as she set _A History of Magic_ on Tom's counter and watched him set out four potatoes. He quickly Scoured them and then set a Baking Charm on them, and he pulled out two large Preserved steaks and a little crate of mushrooms. He added butter to the mushrooms and a splash of wine, and another spell set them to cooking. Hermione hissed at him over the sound of cooking meat and simmering mushrooms,

"I need to know that you will never do anything like that again."

"Things are different now," he sniffed. He took out four wine glasses and poured some in. Hermione scowled.

"It's noon on a Sunday. How about something a bit weaker than elf-made wine?"

"It's a Quidditch match," he argued, pouring the wine. He stared at her. "You do not trust me."

Hermione shifted on her feet and whispered, "In the world I left behind, you sent your Horcrux of a snake to inhabit the reanimated corpse of the murdered Bathilda Bagshot, Tom Riddle. What am I meant to think?"

"That things are _different_ here," he said. He took her face in his hands and bent down until his forehead touched hers. He breathed slowly and murmured, "Our friends are here to enjoy a Quidditch match with us."

"Our friends," Hermione repeated, somewhat in disbelief. "Do we have friends together, you and I?"

"I should like to have something together, you and I," he replied. He bent to brush his lips against hers, and then the meat let out a loud hiss on the cooking surface beside them. Tom turned away, using his utensils to dole out four plates of steak, potato, and mushrooms. Hermione began carrying plates into the sitting room whilst Tom cleaned up his cooking mess, and then she brought Nott and Avery glasses of red wine.

"Had no idea you could cook, Tom," said Nott through a bite of steak.

"Not all of us have House-Elves," Tom shrugged. "In any case, it's good to be able to fend for oneself, I believe. The elves don't follow you everywhere, and even if they did, it's not as though they're meant to do everything for us."

Hermione picked up her wine glass and stared at Tom in surprise. She smiled just a little at him. Avery snorted a laugh and joked,

"Our House-Elf is useless. Burns food. Misses spots on clothes. My father says if she doesn't clean up her act soon, he'll get rid of her and replace her."

"Get rid of her," Hermione repeated. "What will he do with her?"

"I dunno," Avery shrugged. "Never thought about it."

"Hermione's very interested in the welfare of House-Elves," Tom said in a light voice. "She's thinking of initiating a movement, the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare. I do hope that some of my old friends will be generous enough to make monetary donations and, more importantly, to commit to the theoretical aims of the organisation."

"What are the aims?" Nott asked. Hermione cleared her throat, feeling her eyes well a little. She sat up straighter and said,

"S.P.E.W. will first be concerned with ensuring that House-Elves are granted safe and reasonable working conditions, including a lack of corporal punishment and a fair amount of free time."

Nott and Avery stared at one another, and then at Tom Riddle, and then at Hermione. Nott sipped from his wine and said,

"I'm not so sure my father would be keen on that. He whips our elf if it does the slightest thing wrong."

"But don't you think that's just a bit awful?" Hermione asked hotly. "Everyone makes mistakes. We all make mistakes. Avery, if your House-Elf isn't very good at laundry, or if she isn't the best cook, perhaps she could use some lessons. Or if she's old, she could be respectfully retired from service."

"I see what you mean, Miss Granger," Avery said cautiously. Tom drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair, and he shrugged.

"So. What do you say? Would you two like to be founding members of S.P.E.W.?"

"Spew, is it?" Nott asked in confusion, but Hermione felt her cheeks go hot, and she shook her head.

"It's S-P-E-W," Tom said. "I mean to enact all sorts of change in the wizarding world. You two know that. I will be a force for monumental shifts. This is just one little adjustment that we're hoping the most privileged families will be willing to make… treating their House-Elves a bit better. Hmm?"

"Yes, of course," Avery said, and then there was a roar on the Wireless. The announcer exclaimed that the Golden Snitch had been released and that the match had begun, so Nott and Avery turned their attention to the radio. Hermione gazed upon Tom and watched him spear a mushroom with his fork.

No, she thought. This was not the same Tom Riddle who would grow into the Lord Voldemort she'd fought. This wizard cared enough about her to push for the cause Ron and Harry had mocked relentlessly. Even after leaving Hogwarts, when Hermione had continued to fight for House-Elf rights, Ron had never actually cared about it. He'd kept insisting to Hermione that she was on a fool's errand, that she was trying to give privileges to creatures that didn't want them. But Tom Riddle cared about S.P.E.W., because he cared about Hermione.

She glanced up to where her copy of _A History of Magic_ lay on his kitchen counter, and she thought of what Bathilda Bagshot had written inside. She thought of Tom dancing with her the night before at the wedding. She thought of coming back here with him afterward and kissing him until their lips were bruised before finally letting him walk her home. She thought of Porridge, and of working in Borgin and Burkes. She looked around the sitting room and realised she was socialising.

And then she thought of what Professor Dumbledore had said - that she was exactly where she needed to be, and that he needed the Hermione that she was.

She reached for Tom's fingers, and he set down his fork and squeezed her hand for a moment, flashing her a little smile as Nott and Avery cheered on a Kenmare Kestrel goal.

**Author's Note: All right. Things are calm right now. But we're at about the halfway****(****ish) point of the story, and I promise there's a lot more action, excitement, and intrigue to come. So buckle up and get ready! And, oh… there's definitely some good ****Tomione** **action headed your way, too.** **:****} Thanks so much for reading and reviewing.**


	16. Chapter 16

_Hermione opened her eyes and breathed in the warm scent of the wizard beside her. The air in the bedroom felt calm and familiar. Hermione sat up slowly and felt her mouth drop open. _

_Ronald Weasley was in bed beside her._

_He was facing away from her, shirtless in the bed with the rose-patterned sheets. His ginger hair was a mess, fallen down around his face as he slept. His back heaved slowly. Hermione glanced down to see that her modest engagement ring was on her finger again. She swallowed hard, realising she'd come back to the life she'd left behind._

'_Ronald?' she said in a shaking voice. Suddenly she thought of Porridge, of __Borgin_ _and Burkes. Of… him. She pulled at Ron's shoulder and dragged him towards her. 'Ron?'_

_But when he rolled over toward her, there was a great shift in the room. Suddenly the bed warped a little, and the sheets had gone white. The wizard who was facing Hermione had dark waves, and as he propped himself up onto one elbow, bleary with sleep, Tom Riddle asked,_

'_Why are you calling me Ron?'_

'_I was… dreaming,' Hermione whispered. A cat meowed from the foot of the bed. Hermione looked to her feet to see Porridge arching her back. She glanced down to her hand to see that her ring was gone. _

Hermione gasped and sprang to sit up, grabbing at her blankets and panting wildly. She rubbed at her eyes and then flung herself onto her back again. She stared at the ceiling and tried to calibrate where she was. She was in Tom's flat. She'd stayed all afternoon and evening after Nott and Avery had left. She and Tom had gone to The Leaky Cauldron for dinner. Then they'd come back here and had kissed and touched one another and drunk quite a bit of wine before collapsing into bed for the night.

"Hermione?" mumbled Tom from beside her. Hermione shut her eyes and turned her face to look at him. He was just blinking his eyes open, but he whispered, "Bad dream?"

"Strange dream," she corrected him. She pinched her lips and clenched her eyes, and she said, "I dreamed that I woke up next to Ron Weasley. He was sleeping in my bed in the flat I left behind. I was wearing my ring. But when I tried to roll him over, it was you. And then I _really_ woke up, here in your flat, and… oh, it's all just a bit confusing."

"I imagine it is confusing," Tom said, "to fall asleep with the wizard you love and to wake up in a world you don't know."

"But I am here now," Hermione said softly. She dragged her teeth over her bottom lip and said quietly, "I am here with you now."

He reached to cup her jaw in his hand, and he told her, "I'll be right back."

He moved out of bed then, wearing nothing but his black flannel pyjama trousers, and he went to his little bathroom. Hermione listened as the door clicked shut, and she huffed a breath. She reached for her wand from the bedside table and Scoured her mouth and teeth, casting a Peppermint Fresh Charm on her breath. She Scoured her body and Freshened her skin until she knew she smelled all right. She set her wand back down and realised just how easily magic came to her in her adult life. She could have never imagined, as a Muggle child, cleaning herself whilst lying in bed.

Tom came back out of the bathroom, set his wand down on the bedside table, and climbed back under the blankets. He smelled like the sea, like leather, and his breath was fresh, too. Hermione felt a strong urge to kiss him, despite having dreamed of Ron. She rolled a little until she could seize Tom's face in her hands, and she whispered against his mouth,

"Promise me something."

"That depends," he told her, laughing a little.

"Promise me you didn't do anything to Professor Dumbledore," Hermione said. "Promise me you didn't Vanish my engagement ring. Promise me you had nothing to do with me coming here."

Tom pushed himself onto an elbow and stared at Hermione. His throat bobbed, and he shook his head.

"I think," he said, "that your engagement ring disappeared because the thread you left behind no longer exists as you knew it. A world where Hermione Granger and Ronald Weasley were engaged is no longer real. That is what I think."

Hermione shut her eyes. The idea of that, the idea that she and Ron were no longer a couple and would never again be a couple, wounded and stung for a great many reasons. She thought of dancing with Ron in the Muggle nightclub. She thought of kissing him in the Chamber of Secrets after destroying Voldemort's Horcrux. She thought of him as a first-year student on the Hogwarts Express.

"You're gone from me," Tom said quietly, reaching up to tuck Hermione's hair behind her ear. Hermione leaned against his hand and whispered,

"I'm right here."

She let him hold her face for a moment, and then she opened her eyes. Tom met her gaze and promised her in a steely voice,

"I had nothing to do with Albus Dumbledore's disappearance. Bear in mind that there are a great many terrible things I would be willing to do to Albus Dumbledore, because I have loathed that man for years. But I did not send him hurtling through time, Hermione. He does, however, appear to have travelled to a timeline where you married Harry Potter. He somehow sent a photograph through space and time with a note written on the back. He told you to stay."

"I know he did," Hermione said a bit crossly.

"I had nothing to do with you coming here," Tom told her, "though I am doing absolutely everything I can to ensure that you stay. I have a vested interest, Miss Granger, in you remaining here. I mean to climb, and I should like to have you as something of an ally as I do. As to that… I want to ask your opinion."

"My opinion." Hermione raised her brows and sat up a little. Tom Riddle wanted her opinion? She cleared her throat. "On what?"

"You were talking to Nott yesterday," Tom said, "and Avery took the opportunity to tell me about a position at the Ministry that's just come available. A position in the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes, at the Obliviator Headquarters."

Hermione frowned. "And why are you so concerned about an Obliviator position coming available, Tom?"

"Because," he said patiently, "I think that the best way for me to be very powerful one day is by becoming one of the youngest Ministers for Magic in history. I thought perhaps I might obtain that Obliviator position, make my mark at the Ministry by networking with as many higher-ups as I possibly can, and then -"

"Wait." Hermione interrupted him, putting her fingers to his bare chest. Her heart began to race as she asked, "You're going to work for the Ministry of Magic?"

Suddenly she remembered that Tom Riddle had once asked Albus Dumbledore for a teaching position at Hogwarts. Albus Dumbledore had denied him. That, perhaps, had been quite foolish of Dumbledore, Hermione now thought. Perhaps Dumbledore had been afraid that Tom Riddle would recruit students to the Darkness, but perhaps being a teacher at the school would have quelled and tempered at least some of the madness that was allowed to burst free when Lord Voldemort became Dumbledore's open enemy in the late 1960s.

"I think that working at the Ministry would allow me to make both upward and downward connections," Tom said, reaching to brush his fingers over Hermione's. "Many of my old school friends work at the Ministry, and I could stay connected with them easily through work. I could… you know…"

"Recruit," Hermione said, tipping her head. Tom cocked up an eyebrow.

"Make new friends," he said cautiously. "New acquaintances. Hold parties at my friends' houses. And I could hobnob with the elite in the Ministry's ranks. I could climb quickly. What do you think?"

"I think it is the most marvelous idea I've ever heard," Hermione breathed. She seized Tom's face and bent down to kiss him hard. She must have taken him a little by surprise, because he grunted a bit and touched at her bare waist. She'd slept in her bra and knickers, and now he rubbed his hands up her ribcage as he kissed her back. Finally, he tore his mouth from hers and asked breathlessly,

"So, you think I should go to the Ministry today and get the position?"

"Well, I certainly think you should at least _apply_ for the position," Hermione teased, "though I'm not sure they'll find anyone more skilled at Obliviation."

"Says the witch who Obliviated her own parents and then expertly restored their memories," Tom murmured. Hermione went serious for a moment, but Tom whispered, "You bloody brilliant woman."

She kissed him again then, harder this time until their teeth clacked together. Hermione finally pulled back a little, feeling a rush of want go through her. She flushed a bit wet between her legs, and she reached between her body and Tom's to feel that he was hardening in his pyjama trousers. She started to shove them down, but he shook his head and mumbled,

"Mmph. Not yet."

"What?" Hermione was confused, even as he pushed at her shoulders a little to get her to lie on her back. His hand slid beneath her back and unfastened the clasp of her bra, pulling it away over her shoulders and down off her arms. He tossed it off the bed, and he knelt beside Hermione as he put both hands on her breasts. He stared right into her eyes, kneading the soft tissue as his thumbs toyed with the nipples that had gone stiff. He dragged the pads of his thumbs over the pink peaks, his eyes fluttering shut as he did. Hermione arched her back a little and tipped her head onto the pillow, and then he released her breasts, sliding his fingertips in a long, slow line over her flat belly. He reached the waistband of her knickers and wriggled them down, and Hermione moved and squirmed until he'd rid her of them. He threw them over the side of the bed to join the bra, and then he pushed apart her knees.

Soon she realised just what he meant to do, and she moaned aloud as awareness washed over her. She'd hesitantly asked Ron for this one time. She could vividly remember doing so.

'_So, __erm_… _did you know that most witches agree the most pleasurable thing a wizard can do to her is to use his mouth? Down there?' Hermione had felt her face go red where they'd been lying in her bed. Ron had scowled._

'_Eugh__,' he'd said, recoiling a little. 'Wouldn't it taste… off?'_

_Hermione had huffed. 'Well, I don't know, Ronald. People agree it's very pleasurable.'_

'_Doesn't sound very pleasurable,' Ron had sneered, and he had never done it._

"Rule Number One," Hermione scolded, for she could feel Tom watching the memory. He smirked a little at her from where he knelt between her legs. He put a hand on either knee and shrugged.

"I may not be very experienced with any of this," he said, "but I am at least willing to try."

"I refuse to compare you to him," Hermione said, squeezing her eyes shut. She felt Tom's fingers touch at her sodden entrance, and she hissed in gratification.

"Good," she heard him say. "I don't want you to compare me to anybody. I just want you to lie back and enjoy this."

"Tom…" Hermione grasped at the blankets around her, opening her eyes and watching as Tom put his lips to the inside of Hermione's knee. He kissed her there, just one gentle kiss on the skin of her leg, but still she shivered. He began moving his kisses up the inside of her thigh, planting one after another in a slow, steady line. His hands slid up and down her thighs, almost like a massage. He finally held onto her hips and pressed down a little, bearing her against the mattress as his lips reached the crease of her thigh. He kissed her there for a long time, and Hermione keened out with desire. She felt herself go hot and wet for him, felt an insistent throb between her thighs and a coiling in her lower belly. Her face and neck tingled; her breasts prickled in the cool air of the room.

Tom's fingers sank into her hips as his mouth moved over just a tiny bit. He began to suck on the lips of Hermione's womanhood, dragging them into his mouth for a moment before releasing them one at a time. He did this over and over until Hermione felt swollen with need. Her hands flew into his hair, tangling in his messy waves, and she scratched at his scalp. He seemed to like that. He pressed his tongue flat against Hermione's entrance and dragged it up, and Hermione wormed her body against the sheets. She wasn't sure what to do with herself as he lapped at her, so she just made a sound through gritted teeth and squeezed at his hair.

His left hand migrated up from her hip and coursed around her stomach, reaching for a breast. He compressed his fingers there as he licked again, and his right hand stroked at the outside of her hip and thigh. He kept licking, his tongue flat and slow, from bottom to top. Hermione squirmed and squealed, desperate for more. She arched her back when he reached her clit and sucked on it for a long moment, and she felt a burst of heat in her ears when he finally released her and licked at her folds again. He pressed his tongue into her entrance and hooked it, using the rest of his mouth to suck hard on Hermione's clit until she pounded her fists on the sheets and exclaimed,

"Tom!"

"Mmmph." His hands went to her waist, and he pinned her to the bed as she flailed a bit. He lapped more quickly at her clit, flicking his tongue back and forth over it a few times and then sucking again. Hermione threw her head back and felt everything detonate inside of her like a Blasting Curse. She felt her walls clamping, felt heat flush through her veins. She heard a high-pitched ring in her ears and saw spots behind her eyelids. She panted frantically through the climax and then began to descend from her high, finally whispering,

"Tom. _Tom_. Oh… Tom."

When she opened her eyes, he'd pushed himself up to kneel, and he was rather frantically shoving his pyjama trousers down. Hermione winced a little; she wasn't sure if her body was ready yet for intense penetration so soon after a vivid climax like the one she'd just had. But Tom dragged his wrist over his wet, swollen lips and tipped his head back a little, clutching his cock in his hand, and he mumbled,

"Can I just… erm…"

"Yes." Hermione watched, fascinated, as he pumped his hand a few times on his visibly throbbing cock, as his come leaped out and landed on her belly in little puddles. They hadn't cast a contraceptive charm, she realised. She'd need to be careful getting cleaned up. But she couldn't help touching the little mess he'd made, the creamy shambles he'd left on her skin. She dragged her finger through it, and she watched Tom shiver a little where he knelt. She met his eyes, and he murmured,

"You're very pretty."

_A place where I tell you you're pretty,_ she thought, and her eyes burned badly. _A place where you like it when I touch you._

She finally let him Siphon and Scour her until she was clean again, and then they half-heartedly began to dress. Hermione put on her clothes from the day before, Transfiguring the colour and material just enough so that if she ran into anyone from yesterday, it wouldn't be obvious that she had spent the night at Tom Riddle's flat.

"Perhaps," said Tom from the doorway of his bedroom, "You ought to keep a change of clothes here, for when you spend the night."

"Or perhaps I ought not make a habit of spending the night," Hermione teased.

"Why not?" he demanded. "You're my…"

He trailed off then, and when Hermione looked up from putting on her shoes, she saw that his face had gone quite red. He cleared his throat loudly and shrugged.

"Well. I'm going to apply for the Obliviator position at the Ministry of Magic. I think that will be the best way for me to ascend to a position of real authority without damaging myself or the world at large the way you witnessed me do."

"I am happy to see you do this," Hermione told him. "I very much hope you get the position."

"Don't worry," Tom said, tightening up his tie as he walked out into the sitting room. "I'll get it. Just the same, don't tell Mr Burke where I've gone. Tell him I'm ill today."

"I'm not going to lie for you," Hermione scowled. Tom rolled his eyes and shrugged.

"Fine. Tell him you have no idea where I am."

"That's still a lie," Hermione argued. Tom's eyes went wide with frustration, and he finally said,

"Just don't tell him that I'm missing work to go apply for a new position, all right? Gracious. I'll come to your flat after dinner and let you know how it's all worked out."

"Right." Hermione curled up her lips. He bent to kiss her forehead, and she said a bit sheepishly, "Erm. Thanks for… you know, for what you did this morning."

"It was a pleasure, truly," Tom said, twining Hermione's hair around his finger. He bent again, this time pressing his lips to the cheek that had gone hot, and he whispered, "You taste _very_ good."

She was breathless then as he made a move for his dress shoes. They headed for the door, and Tom warded up his flat with a swish of his wand once they were outside. They descended the stairs, and Hermione knew they were about to part ways. She'd be going to the Leaky Cauldron, to walk through Diagon and Knockturn Alleys, back to her flat to change clothes and feed Porridge before heading to work. And Tom was off to the Ministry of Magic to try to begin the course of an entirely new thread.

An entirely new somewhere.

At the bottom of the stairs, in the foyer of Tom's building, she reached for his hand and squeezed tightly. He gave her a concerned look, for she had a serious expression painted on. She nodded and said firmly,

"Girlfriend."

Tom just blinked. He knew what she meant. Just the same, Hermione clarified,

"I am your girlfriend."

Tom smirked and descended to brush his lips against hers. She whispered onto his mouth,

"Best of luck, Mr Riddle."

"See you tonight, Miss Granger," Tom replied. He took a step back and Disapparated in silence, and Hermione sighed before walking out the building's front door.

**Author's Note: ****Wooo****! So they're finally **_**together, together**_**, and Hermione seems genuinely at peace with that. Moreover, Tom is plotting a new course of action that involves him ascending to power through the Ministry of Magic instead of as a "cult leader." Will he get the job? What will Mr Burke say? What will the "old friends" think? **

**As always, I value your readership and especially your feedback so very much. Thank you to all those who have reviewed.**


	17. Chapter 17

Hermione Scoured the shelf displaying enchanted clocks, studying the curiosities. One was charmed to awaken the user whenever it was time to wake. Hermione wondered distantly how that spell worked. She couldn't quite figure it out. Mr Burke had explained earlier today to her that the clock simply _knew_ when its user needed to awaken, and chimed accordingly. That seemed like terribly complex magic, and Hermione wanted to know more. She brushed her fingers over the lacquered black wood of the clock, and she whispered,

"Tell me your secrets."

The door to Borgin and Burkes opened, and the doorbell chimed. Hermione jolted to attention as Walburga Black came sweeping into the shop. Today was pleasant again, so Walburga was wearing woolen robes but no outer cloak. She turned her nose up just a little at Hermione and asked tightly,

"Where's Tom?"

"He's not in today," Hermione said simply. "May I help you, Miss Black?"

"I'm looking for a new piece of jewellery," Walburga said. "I'd like something very fine. Something… intriguing. Something unique."

"Hmm." Hermione walked back around the glass counter and opened the cabinet. She pulled out the black velvet display in one of the sections of the cabinet. On it lay the silvery ring with scarlet inlaid stones - the ruby ring Tom had gone to Wales to retrieve. Hermione pulled it out of the display and held it out to Walburga, whose eyes lit up.

"It's beautiful," Walburga breathed.

"The ring belonged to the vampire Asharwa. It is rumoured to have special powers of some kind."

"Special powers?" Walburga sounded intrigued. "What sort of special powers?"

"It's not clear," Hermione said. "But Tom Riddle went on something of a quest to find it and bring it here. It's very… valuable."

"Expensive, you mean." Walburga pinched her lips, and Hermione laughed quietly.

"Three hundred Galleons."

"That's not so bad," Walburga shrugged. Hermione felt her eyes go wide. Walburga reached into her embroidered handbag and pulled out a rectangle of parchment with elegant writing upon it. Hermione immediately recognised the elaborate logo of Gringotts Bank. Walburga picked up the quill on the Borgin and Burkes desk and dipped it into the tarnished silver inkwell. She set down the little cheque and began writing it out. It was a note for a transfer of funds from Walburga Black's vault to the Borgin and Burkes shop vault. These types of cheques were not used very often, because purchases these large were not made very often.

Hermione smiled a little as she took the cheque from Walburga and handed over the ruby ring. She opened the till and put the cheque inside, and as she shut the drawer, she asked,

"Shall I box and wrap it for you?"

"I think I'll wear it." Walburga pushed the ruby ring onto the fourth finger of her right hand. She made a happy little noise and kissed the rubies, and Hermione flinched a little. She remembered what Tom had said about the ring, that the vampire Asharwa had kissed the rubies after taking victims. Somehow, it seemed fitting that Walburga Black was wearing this ring. Hermione thought Mr Burke would be awfully pleased that she'd sold it.

"So, is Tom off hunting more relics?" Walburga asked lightly. Hermione hesitated and then said,

"He's off… examining an exciting opportunity. I think he would like to see you again soon, Miss Black. He speaks so highly of you."

"Does he?" Walburga frowned a little. She seemed a bit confused. "He never seemed fond of me in school. Or perhaps…"

_Perhaps I wasn't fond of him, _Hermione knew Walburga was thinking. But Hermione cleared her throat and said,

"You're good friends with Druella Rosier and Odessa Lestrange, aren't you? I feel so badly for Madam Lestrange. Such a tragedy."

"Oh. Yes. Poor Odessa." Walburga's face fell a bit. "It might be nice to have a little get-together soon. Something to take her mind off of the loss of the baby."

"Hmm." Hermione just tipped her head. Walburga coughed quietly, eyed the ruby ring Hermione had just sold her, and said,

"You'd have to come, of course. You and Tom. You're _with_ him, from what I hear."

"I am." Hermione said it with more confidence than she'd expected to have. She swallowed hard and nodded, saying again, "I am, yes."

"Well, of course you and Tom will be there, then. At my new house on Grimmauld Place."

Hermione's stomach went cold and twisted. She thought of the Order of the Phoenix convening in Grimmauld Place. She thought of using it as a hideout with Harry and Ron after the wedding where Death Eaters had shown up and wreaked havoc. She blinked, realising that this thread, this existence, was completely different. She wasn't engaged to Ron Weasley here. She wasn't scarred by Bellatrix Lestrange here. Tom was seeking Ministry employment here. Could Hermione go back to Grimmauld Place and actually socialise?

Perhaps she could, she thought. She gave a little smile to Walburga Black and said softly,

"I'm sure Tom would love to be there."

"Thanks for the ring," Walburga said. "It's Hermione, isn't it? Your given name?"

"Hermione, yes." She stared into Walburga's dark eyes and saw Sirius' gaze there. She suddenly found herself asking, "Is Orion… are you and he…?"

"Oh. No. I'm not sure where you've been getting your rumours." Walburga's cheeks coloured. "Orion and I were meant to be married this time next year, but it's been called off. Orion and I just don't get on too terribly well. I think I'm going to start looking elsewhere. I confess I've got a bit of a crush on someone else."

Hermione was silent, for she knew that Orion had been Sirius Black's father. If Orion and Walburga did not marry here, would Sirius and Regulus be Un-Born? Walburga leaned forward a little and said,

"I've got a bit of a crush on Abraxas Malfoy, if I'm honest."

Hermione's eyes went round. Abraxas Malfoy? No. That wasn't right. He didn't marry Walburga Black. Hermione didn't know who Lucius Malfoy's mother had been, but it hadn't been Walburga Black.

But everything was different here, she thought with a sudden jolt. Here, she had no scar of the word _Mudblood_ on her arm. She had no engagement ring. Albus Dumbledore was gone from this existence, gone to a place just as strange and foreign as this world. This Tom Riddle was not a warped and wicked Lord Voldemort. He was a young wizard who cared about S.P.E.W., who was trying to get employment in the Department of Magical Accidents of Catastrophes.

Was it so very ludicrous that the Walburga Black of this thread might fall in love with this Abraxas Malfoy? Perhaps there would be no Sirius Black at all, no Lucius Malfoy. Perhaps Walburga and Abraxas would go on to have some other child whose name Hermione had never even heard.

"Well, I'm off," Walburga huffed. "I've got new robes to pick up at Signor Alfredo's."

Hermione raised her eyebrows and wondered whether Walburga Black had all the money in the world. She flashed the snooty Pureblood witch a little smile and said,

"Good day to you, Miss Black."

"Walburga." She touched at her smooth dark hair and turned to go. Hermione watched Walburga Black stalk out of Borgin and Burkes, and she wondered as the door shut whether she'd lost herself entirely to this new place and time.

* * *

"Porridge!" Hermione held out a piece of kibble flat in her palm. She knelt on the floor of her sitting room and watched as the beautiful Siamese cat came trotting toward her. Porridge nibbled at the kibble. Hermione pet the cat's silky fur and bent down to brush her nose against the top of Porridge's head.

"Good girl," she hummed. "Who says you can't train a cat, hmm? Let's try again."

She tossed another piece of kibble across the room, and Porridge went dashing toward it. Porridge gobbled up the food, chomping on it as her tail slowly wagged in the air. Hermione stared at Porridge and thought of Crookshanks. She thought of the bushy orange half-Kneazle, the way Ron hadn't liked him nearly as much as Ginny had done. Hermione thought of Crookshanks chasing Wizard's Chess pieces around, of Ginny luring Crookshanks out of an Order of the Phoenix meeting with Butterbeer corks.

"Porridge?" Hermione's voice was a little weak then. She was here, she thought. She was never going back to that world she'd left behind. She was never travelling forward to a world with Crookshanks again. She was here, in this Knockturn Alley flat owned by a mysterious wizard, with a neighbour who somehow communed with Dumbledore through time and space. Hermione held out a piece of kibble in her palm and cleared her throat. "Porridge!"

The cat looked up and stared right at Hermione, then turned and walked away into the bedroom. Hermione scowled. She heard knocking on the door to her right, and she called,

"Coming!"

She put the kibble back into the canvas sack of cat food and pulled the drawstring. She tossed it near Porridge's water bowl and pushed herself to her feet, striding over to the door. She pulled it open and saw Tom Riddle standing before her in a neatly tailored robe, his hair combed just so, his tie perfectly cinched around his neck. His lips curled into a handsome smirk, and he twirled his pale yew wand in his long fingers.

"Good evening, Miss Granger."

"Well," she said, stepping aside, "you're in a jolly mood, Mr Riddle."

He shut the door and tucked his wand away. He folded his hands before him and said smoothly,

"Meet the newest Obliviator at the Ministry of Magic."

Hermione's eyes went wide. "You got the position."

"Of course I did." Tom shrugged. "The Head of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes was so elated to see me come asking after the position that there wasn't even a real interview. He offered me the job straight away."

"Oh, for goodness' sake." Hermione laughed a little. He was full of himself. Well, of course he was; he was Tom Marvolo Riddle. He was known to be the most gifted pupil Hogwarts had ever known.

"I've just come from Borgin and Burkes," said Tom. "I've told him that he'll have to get someone else to hunt down his artefacts for him, but that you're more than capable of managing the shop and handling sales. Because you are, of course."

Hermione swelled a little. She shook her head. "I don't think Mr Burke thinks very highly of me."

Tom narrowed his eyes. "You'd be surprised. I heard you sold Walburga Black the vampire's ring for three hundred Galleons today. You're doing just fine, Miss Self-Educated Hermione Granger."

She scoffed a little and reached up for his face. She cupped his jaw in her hand and dragged her fingers toward his chin, murmuring,

"You're going to work at the Ministry."

"They've already given me a little office and everything." Tom raised his eyebrows. "It's actually quite beneficial to the job that I'm a Half-Blood raised in a Muggle orphanage, since Obliviators have to interact with Muggles discreetly. And there's all sorts of upward mobility. There is one Wizengamot member from the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes. I'd like to snag that spot as soon as possible."

Hermione smiled up at him. Her heart began to race as she started to question just how real all of this was. How real was he, this _boyfriend_ for whom she'd begun to fall? He was not Lord Voldemort. Not anymore. He was the aspirational, earnest, talented wizard who had bought her a cat and danced with her, who had slept with her and was now working as an Obliviator. He wasn't the evil man whose Horcruxes she'd destroyed, the demon she'd watched die at the Battle of Hogwarts.

"Tom," she murmured, but then she jumped. There was knocking on the door behind him. Tom whipped out his wand and frowned deeply. Hermione pulled her own wand out and cautiously stepped toward the door, pulling it open. She found herself staring right at the old, deaf neighbour with the twin white braids, the mother of Madam Mutatia. The old witch held out an envelope, which read in a familiar neat script, _Miss Hermione Granger._

Hermione took the envelope in silence, and the old woman turned to go. Hermione opened her mouth to call after her, but she knew it was useless. The old witch opened her door, next to Hermione's, and slipped inside. Hermione peered into the witch's flat and could see a circle of candles set up on the ground. Hermione frowned a bit, wondering just what sort of wild Divination the witch had been up to that had brought about this letter.

She moved back into her flat and shut the door, turning over the envelope with trembling hands. She dusted her fingertips over the seal on the back, red wax with the crest of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. She broke the seal with her finger and opened the envelope. She pulled out the letter inside and unfolded the parchment, and she began to read.

_5 February 2000_

_Hogwarts School_ _of Witchcraft and Wizardry_

_Dear Miss Granger,_

_I write to implore you to keep the ship of your life sailing upon its present course. _

_You may have realised by now that your arrival in your new life was hardly accidental. The world you left behind was disastrous in so very many ways. Countless lives were needlessly lost. The hope is that in sending you to a novel timeline, a course correction could be achieved and tragedy could be averted._

_I have all confidence, having moved forward myself, that you will be successful in achieving the aim of contributing to the peace and equanimity of the wizarding world. What you do in your new life will save many people, and though I appreciate the sacrifice involved in leaving your old life behind, I also am made to believe that you are a selfless witch. What you are offering your community through your time travel is invaluable and appreciated._

_You may be wondering about the wedding photograph showing you and Harry Potter together. That, I am afraid, I can not explain in detail… at least not right now. Please trust that you are precisely where you ought to be. Tom Riddle needs you, __the you_ _that you are. _

_Weather the storms that come your way and steer your ship with confidence. You are, I have been made quite aware, an undeniably brilliant witch._

_Yours very sincerely,_

_Professor Dumbledore_

Hermione read the letter again, and then a third time. She raised her eyes to Tom, and he just blinked a few times. He said nothing for a long while. Hermione folded up the letter and shoved it back into the envelope. She set the envelope on her kitchen counter and asked tightly,

"Tea? Would you like some tea?"

"Hermione," Tom said quietly, but she ignored him. She opened her cupboard and pulled out the tin of tea bags, yanked out two tea cups, and grabbed at her teapot. She filled the teapot with water and set it to boiling, and Tom said again, "Hermione."

"I finally got some sugar," she said in a huff. Tom sighed from behind her and said,

"I don't need sugar."

Hermione plopped the tea bags into the cups and began pouring hot water.

"Hermione," Tom said once again, far more firmly now. She finally whirled around, and she realised he was standing awfully close to her. He threaded the fingers of one hand into her hair and wrapped his other arm around her waist. Hermione backed up toward her counter and let Tom descend until his lips brushed hers.

"You are here because of me," he murmured. "You and I were meant to… we're meant to…"

_Be together,_ she thought, her head spinning. She blinked slowly and nodded. She pressed her lips to his and touched his shoulders, rubbing a bit.

"Congratulations," she hummed, "on your Ministry position. I am very proud of you."

"Are you?" he asked, kissing her again. "Are you proud of me, Hermione?"

She had a frantic thought then. She wasn't just proud of him. She was fond of him. Terribly fond of him. She craved his body. She was impressed by his magical giftedness. She was charmed by his personality. She was…

_No,_ she scolded herself with a wild whirl of inky blackness in her head. Tom pulled back and stared down at her. He blinked and nodded, and she knew he understood. This was much more than mere infatuation. This was no crush. Hermione gulped.

"Walburga Black is having a party soon," she said, just to talk. "She's having a party to make Odessa Lestrange feel better. We'll be invited. It was sort of my idea. I was trying to create an opportunity for you to see all of your old friends."

His dark eyes flashed, and he tucked Hermione's hair behind her ear. He kissed her forehead and kept his lips against her skin for a long moment. Then there was a little _meow_ from the ground, and Hermione glanced down to see that Porridge had walked up and was gazing up at them with her sapphire eyes.

"She's hungry," Hermione said. "I was training her with kibble when you came."

"Training a cat?" Tom asked in disbelief as Hermione stepped away, walking toward Porridge's bowls. Hermione glanced over her shoulder and said,

"She's very intelligent."

"Of course she is," Tom said, rolling his eyes. He put his hands into his pockets and cleared his throat. "Erm… listen, I'm going to go to a Muggle tailor's shop and get a few new suits made up. There's a place on Charing Cross Road that's open until eight. I need Muggle-style clothes as an Obliviator, you understand."

"Oh. Of course," Hermione nodded. Tom shifted on his feet and said,

"See you, then."

Hermione stared at him from where she knelt on the ground. She eyed the envelope on her kitchen counter - the letter from Dumbledore that had somehow come through time and space. She huffed a breath and told Tom again,

"Congratulations, Tom. Really. I'm just so very happy that you're going to be working at the Ministry."

"This thread is unlike anything anyone's ever experienced," Tom said very firmly. Hermione thought of Walburga Black talking about having a crush on Abraxas Malfoy. She thought of how her scar and engagement ring had disappeared. She nodded and watched Tom leave, and the moment the door shut behind Tom, she pet Porridge and whispered to the cat,

"You know, Porridge, I'm rather head over heels for that wizard."

**Author's Note: ****Ahhhhhhhh****. Letter from Dumbledore! Sirius and Lucius potentially being Un-Born! Tom's going to be working at the Ministry! And they're falling in…? Eek! Who's looking forward to Walburga's party and Tom's work as an Obliviator?**


	18. Chapter 18

"I'll have the potato leek soup with crusty bread, please," Hermione told Celia in the White Wyvern, and from across the table, Tom said politely,

"Same for me, Celia." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a few Sickles, handing them over, and Celia stalked off. Hermione didn't even complain about him paying for her meal. She'd sniped at Ron one time, because he'd insisted that wizards ought to always pay. But that had felt different; it had felt like Ron had been insinuating that witches couldn't or shouldn't pay for themselves. Tom just seemed to want to pay for Hermione's soup and bread, so she let him.

"So," he said, "it turns out that it's rather difficult to come by good Muggle clothes these days."

"Oh. Yes. I suppose they're still in the _Make Do and Mend_ mentality," Hermione guessed. Tom informed her,

"The two suits the Muggle man tailored for me fit fine. They're fine. But our wizarding robes are so much better. It's the main bit of the Obliviator position that I dislike - interacting so much with Muggles."

Hermione gave him a cross look. "There's nothing wrong with Muggles."

Tom rolled his eyes. "Let's not argue."

But Hermione huffed and said, "My parents were very hard-working Muggles. They were dentists."

"Yes," Tom said slowly. "So let us think through it this way. Suppose a dental patient has a cavity in a tooth. How would a Muggle dentist handle it?"

Hermione felt her cheeks go warm, and she shrugged. "With a filling. They would drill into the tooth until the decay was gone. Then they would use material to fill in the cavity."

"Mmm-hmm," Tom said. Celia came back then and set down bowls of potato leek soup with crusty bread. She took two Butterbeers off her tray and put them down, then walked off without a word. Hermione stirred at her soup as Tom declared,

"I had a cavity in a molar one time. Do you know what the Wizarding Dentist did for me, Hermione?"

"No," Hermione said cautiously, for she'd never needed a filling, Muggle or Magical. Tom raised his eyebrows, spooned some soup into his mouth, and said,

"He had me open his mouth, he aimed his wand at the back of my mouth, and he incanted a Cavity Repair Charm. Quick and painless. Cost me a Sickle."

"Well, it isn't that one way or the other is better. They're just different," Hermione argued. Tom rolled his eyes and scoffed.

"I think one of those methods is inarguably better than the other."

"Well," Hermione said primly, "in the world I left behind, we had mobile phones and colour television sets."

Tom was confused, and Hermione seized on his obvious bemusement. She cocked up an eyebrow and took a few spoonfuls of soup before sipping her Butterbeer. Then she said,

"At my parents' house, there was a channel on the full-colour television set that presented the news at all hours of the day. It showed video - like the Muggle films you've seen before - of the happenings from all around the world. There were popular comedy shows that had been filmed in studios. There was dramatic entertainment."

"I prefer books," Tom sniffed. He dipped some of his bread into his soup, and Hermione shook her head, smirking.

"We had mobile phones," she said. "Well, not everyone had them, but my mother had one. She kept it in her handbag, and I could use a telephone in a building to call her anywhere she was. Instantaneous communication."

"I prefer being just a little out of reach," Tom shrugged. Hermione growled and shoved her bread into her soup.

"You are impossible," she told him. "You can't even fathom the idea that maybe - just _maybe_ \- your way isn't the only way."

"I dislike bickering with you," Tom said gruffly, setting down his spoon. Hermione narrowed her eyes at him and opened her mouth, but Tom's cheeks went a little pink, and he said quite firmly, "I do not like to argue with you, Hermione."

"Why not?" she demanded, and he huffed out a heavy breath before he said quietly,

"Because I am in love with you."

Hermione froze, her bottle of Butterbeer in her hand. She slowly set it down, and she shut her eyes. She gulped as she tried to process what he'd said.

"Perhaps I misunderstood," he was murmuring, and he sounded a little frantic. Hermione shook her head and opened her eyes.

"I was sent here to be with you," she reminded the both of them. He nodded at her. He licked his lips slowly, and she felt her eyes sear wickedly. She finally whispered at him,

"I'm in love with you, too, Tom."

"Well," he said, picking up his Butterbeer and taking a sip, "I'm glad that's settled."

Hermione said nothing more as she ate her soup in silence, her heart beating a war tattoo inside her chest.

* * *

"How do you manage this?" Tom asked as he let Hermione into his flat. Hermione drew into Tom's sitting room and frowned.

"Manage what?"

"How do you manage to make yourself look more beautiful for every single one of these social events?" Tom demanded. Hermione stifled a self-conscious laugh. She shook her head and informed Tom,

"This is a second-hand gown. Don't tell Walburga. Or, you know, do. I don't care. I did a little work on it after I bought it, but this gown probably belonged to one of those Pureblood's grandmothers."

"Well, I think you look magnificent." Tom raised his eyebrows. Hermione nodded her thanks. She had bought a periwinkle silk gown and had made radical alterations to the cut and shape. Now it was a one-shouldered Grecian design that draped over Hermione's left arm, leaving her right arm bare. Hermione had Conjured thin silver rope and had criss-crossed it around her torso. The periwinkle silk skirts fell like a waterfall from Hermione's hips. She'd pulled her hair into a thick milkmaid braid across her head, and she'd carefully applied beautification creme.

Tom, for his part, looked very handsome in black brocade dress robes that were abjectly wizarding in fashion. He might have to wear Muggle clothes for his Obliviator work, but he was going to dress like a wizard tonight. He was sending a message, Hermione knew, dressing like this. He was a wizard. He worked for the Ministry of Magic.

"Ready to go?" Hermione asked. Tom tipped his head, twirling the wand he held. He dragged his teeth over his lip and noted,

"You've got history at this house."

"It's where Sirius Black grew up," Hermione said. She sniffed. "It's where the Order of the Phoenix met to discuss ways to defeat… you. Or, you know… Lord Voldemort as I knew him."

Somehow, her Tom Riddle and that Lord Voldemort seemed like two completely different people now. Hermione sighed. She remembered all the times she'd spent in Grimmauld Place with Ron and Harry, the late nights giggling with Ginny. She remembered Kreacher, and Walburga's shrieking portrait. She remembered the Black family tapestry with members burned off for betraying the Pureblood heritage of the clan. She gulped and shut her eyes.

"I'm ready to go," she said. "We should go. I'm meant to be here with you."

Albus Dumbledore had told her multiple times now that she was where she was ought to be. Hermione felt queasy for a moment, opened her eyes, and stalked quickly toward Tom's fireplace. She opened his cut crystal container of Floo Powder and extracted a handful. She wedged herself back into his fireplace and tossed down the powder, shouting,

"_NUMBER TWELVE, GRIMMAULD PLACE, LONDON!"_

She was sucked back into a cold, licking eruption of emerald flame. Darkness encased her for a moment, and then she was hurtled forward. She stumbled as she emerged out of the fireplace at Grimmauld Place, and then she gasped.

She was in the middle of the party.

Tom came striding confidently out of the fireplace behind her, putting his hand on her shoulder as Hermione looked around the parlour of the townhouse. She had soot all over her, she thought frantically, but she felt Tom's wand tip dragging around her as he murmured Scouring spells in a low, calm voice.

"Oh! I'd forgotten you were coming by Floo." Walburga Black emerged from a pack of partygoers and walked over, looking very old-fashioned in dark green and gold velvet robes and a matching headdress that covered most of her hair. She flashed a little smile to Hermione and said, "Miss Granger, you did me quite a favour guiding me to my lovely new trinket. Everyone at the party is enamoured with my vampire's ring."

"I'm so glad you like it, Miss Black," Hermione said. "Thank you for having us."

"Well, don't you look _marvelous,_" breathed Druella Rosier, rushing up and petting the silk of Hermione's caped dress. "A bold fashion choice. She's ahead of her time."

Hermione's stomach went a little cold at that comment, but Tom cleared his throat and came to Hermione's rescue.

"She is unimaginably beautiful, isn't she? Druella, where's your husband-to-be?"

"Shall I fetch him for you?" Druella asked, blinking, and Tom just nodded. Druella dashed off, and Walburga calmly smiled.

"There's elf-made wine, and Kreacher's made the most delicious winter punch with Champagne, orange, and rosemary. You must try it."

"That sounds delightful," Hermione said. Tom bent and placed a kiss on her cheek, and he said quietly,

"I'll go get us some. Back in a moment."

Hermione felt her cheeks go warm, and as Tom walked away, Walburga's eyebrows rose. Odessa Lestrange walked up, and Hermione could see plainly that she was no longer pregnant. She wasn't sure what to say, so she just gave Odessa a sorrowful look and said at last,

"I'm so sorry."

"Thank you." Odessa brushed her fingertips over her stomach and shrugged. "Plenty of time to try again. It was so kind of you and Tom to send flowers."

Hermione frowned. She hadn't sent flowers; Tom had sent flowers. Had he included her on the card? That had been presumptuous of him, if he'd done so. And yet…

She stared at him as he ladled punch from a bowl into two small crystal cups, and her stomach fluttered. She turned her attention to Odessa Lestrange and said,

"I hope you're feeling well now."

"Perfectly well. Thank you. You look so beautiful."

"Druella was just saying that it's quite a _bold_ fashion choice, but a beautiful one," Walburga said, and Odessa curled up her lips.

"Quite so. I wish I were brave enough to wear things like that."

Hermione scowled. She hadn't thought much about wearing a one-shouldered dress. Perhaps the wizarding world's fashion had indeed been far more conservative in this time than it had been during the life she'd left behind. She felt self-conscious, all of a sudden, not because she was a prude, but because she felt out of place.

"I… you know, Muggle actresses are wearing gowns like this," Hermione blurted. She instantly realised she'd said exactly the wrong thing. Walburga's face soured. She sneered,

"Since when do we want to do _anything _the way the Muggles do?"

"I like the way Muggles drive about in automobiles," Odessa shrugged, and Walburga scoffed.

"Those smelly, slow machines? Be reasonable, Odessa. Apparition is far superior. Even broomsticks are safer than those damned things that go puttering outside my house all the time."

"How did you come to live in this house?" Hermione asked lightly, desperate to change the subject. Walburga's face shifted a little, and she looked around.

"Number 12, Grimmauld Place has been in the Black Family since the year 1766. Its ownership has been passed down through deserving members of the family in an unbroken line since then. My grandfather decided that it should go to me. I was very grateful to accept it."

Hermione suddenly wondered just what would happen if Walburga did somehow wind up with Abraxas Malfoy. Wouldn't he have ownership of Malfoy Manor? Would the two of them keep both residences and just be fabulously wealthy? Hermione looked about the parlour and thought of plunking on the piano with Ron Weasley during the long days of hiding. She sighed and said,

"It's a lovely place."

"Miss Granger." Cygnus Black III walked up with Druella Rosier, and he bowed his head a little. "I just spent ten minutes receiving a lecture from Avery on the rights of the House-Elf. Apparently I am now a member of the Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare. I'm not allowed to beat or kick my elf anymore, it seems, and I must give him leisure time? Oh, and I owe membership dues."

"It seems that Mr Avery is aggressively promoting my cause," Hermione laughed. "It's something about which I've felt strongly for some time."

"Have you? As someone who plainly did not grow up in the culture of utilising House-Elves?" asked Walburga Black. An uncomfortable quiet came over the group, and Hermione cleared her throat. She opened her mouth to speak, but Walburga said, "I'm going to go speak with Abraxas for a while. Good to see you all."

She spun on her foot and stalked off. Odessa Lestrange waved her hand and said softly,

"Don't mind her. She's just cross because you look so pretty, Miss Granger. Walburga's a jealous soul."

"Odessa!" Druella hissed, but she laughed a little. Just then, Tom came walking up, and he handed Hermione a glass of punch.

"So sorry for the delay," he said. "Mr Nott wanted to hear about my new position at the Ministry."

"I'd like to hear about it, too!" exclaimed Cygnus Black. Hermione gratefully took her punch and sipped from it. She relished the herbal, citrusy flavour of the punch and hummed contentedly as she said,

"Tom didn't even have to interview. The departmental head was so glad to see him come in that they offered him the job immediately."

"Is that so?" Cygnus looked impressed. "I had to go through four rounds of interviews when I got hired. It was nerve-wracking."

"I suppose I got lucky," Tom said smoothly, sipping his punch. "I've got a nice little office. Plain, but it'll do. My work will consist primarily of finding Muggles who have witnessed magic and carefully altering their memories. Right now, it's an entry-level position, but the ceiling is high. Additionally, the department has Wizengamot access to which I'd like to avail myself in time."

"I've always admired your ambition, Tom," Cygnus Black said. "I think you could be Minister for Magic someday."

"I _will_ be the Minister for Magic someday, Cygnus," said Tom quite firmly. Druella glanced between Cygnus and Tom, and Odessa seemed almost frightened. Tom kept completely calm as he sipped his punch again and said, "Someday I will control the entirety of wizarding Britain."

"And you are, without question, the most qualified person for the job," Hermione said, her voice steely. Cygnus cleared his throat and said,

"You know you'll always have my support, Tom. You've already got a close friend in the Ministry here."

"I know." Tom dragged the pad of his finger over the rim of his punch glass. He smirked a little and said, "I will need a great many friends. All the old ones, and some new ones. But I shall value my first friends most of all."

Cygnus shifted on his feet. Druella held fast to her glass of wine and asked Odessa,

"You and Reynard will always be loyal to Tom, won't you, Odessa?"

"Of course!" Odessa nodded vigorously. "We're your friends through thick and thin, Tom. I hope you know that. The kindness you've already shown us… we could never repay… Reynard and I know that you're destined for greatness, and we…"

She was stumbling, nervous and afraid. Hermione gave her a warm look and told her,

"I'm so very glad to have met you, Odessa. So glad Tom introduced us."

"Well," Druella said tightly, "I think we're all happy to know you, Miss Granger."

"Me most of all," Tom said. He turned to look more fully at Hermione and tipped his head. He sipped his punch again and said, "You know, my friends… when Miss Granger began work at Borgin and Burkes, I found her lovely and intelligent. But I did not realise just what sort of a desperate fool I would become for her."

Hermione's lips parted, and she stared up at Tom in wonder. Odessa looked surprised by Tom's visible ardor. Hermione blinked at Tom, who smiled a little and said,

"Cygnus. Take these glasses of punch and get rid of them."

He took Hermione's glass and handed it with his own to Cygnus Black. Cygnus took the glasses and nodded quickly, obviously a bit taken aback. The witches watched in quiet disbelief as Tom put his hand to the small of Hermione's back, bent down, and put his lips beside her ear.

"Come with me for a moment," he murmured. Hermione tingled, but she blinked and nodded as she let him guide her away from the conversation. He needed to look dominant right now, she knew. Over all of them, he needed to look powerful. She needed to let him look like he was in charge. She wasn't sure what was compelling her to let him lead her out of the sitting room and into the corridor, but a heady sense of want came over her as he did.

She took his hand and allowed him to pull her down the same corridor Hermione had walked countless times in the world she'd left behind. It looked different here. It wasn't dusty or worn. It was kept up, shiny and clean and elegant. Suddenly Hermione was being backed up toward the dark paneled wall, and she gasped as she was pressed by Tom's body. His hands took her face, and he bent to kiss her, his teeth dragging her lip into his mouth. She squealed in surprise, hands grappling at his brocade robes for purchase. He pushed her harder against the wall and dragged his tongue around the roof of Hermione's mouth. She moaned a little and cupped his jaw, her other hand going to his back.

"Hermione," he whispered, his lips brushing hers. "I really am in love with you."

"Oh. Pardon us."

There was a low rumble of laughter against Hermione's mouth then, as Tom pulled back from her. Suddenly she realised that he had not been surprised at all by the way Walburga Black and Abraxas Malfoy had come walking out of the parlour into the corridor. The two others stood nearby, staring at Tom and Hermione. Walburga pinched her lips and folded her hands, and Abraxas was scarlet-faced with an emotion Hermione couldn't quite read.

"Excuse me, Miss Black. That was most uncouth. You've been such a fine hostess," Hermione tried, but Walburga's lips tightened. Tom shrugged and said to Abraxas,

"I confess myself a wizard smitten. Hmm. Hermione?" He turned to her, and she gave him a desperate look. He held out his hand and said, "Let's go socialise a bit more, and we'll conclude these activities later at my flat. Off you go, Abraxas."

**Author's Note: Oh, my. So they're in love. And he's asserting dominance all over the place. Will we hear any more from Dumbledore on how Hermione's increasing closeness to Tom may affect threads? Hmm. Thank you so very much for reading. Please do ****review****.**


	19. Chapter 19

"Good morning," Hermione said as the red-haired wizard who delivered the _Daily Prophet_ came blustering into Borgin and Burkes. The wizard flicked up a little smile and approached the desk, setting down a copy of the newspaper. Hermione took out a few coins from the till and set it down on the glass, and then she slid the newspaper toward herself and asked with caution, "It's Mr Weasley, isn't it?"

"Septimus Weasley. Yes." The wizard seemed like he had much more to do than talk to Hermione, and of course he did have a lot of newspapers to deliver. But Hermione needed answers. She pinched her lips, realising that Septimus was indeed the grandfather of Ronald Weasley. As far as Hermione knew, Ron's grandmother had been a disowned member of the Black family, Cedrella. She cleared her throat and asked as delicately as she could,

"Mr Septimus Weasley. Your wife is Cedrella? Is that right?"

"What, you've a problem with us, as well?" Septimus puffed up his chest. "I'll not defend myself to you."

Hermione held up her hands and shook her head wildly. "N-No. I'm… I'm Muggle-born. I meant no offence."

"We've got a boy." Septimus Weasley's eyes welled heavily. "Our little boy, Bilius. He doesn't need all of the hatred, you understand."

"I'm sorry. I ought not to have asked," Hermione said quietly. She gulped. Ron had often spoken of his Uncle Bilius. She let out a quaking breath and tapped the copy of the _Daily Prophet._ "Thank you for the newspaper, Mr Weasley."

"Right. Good day." Septimus Weasley whirled on his foot and walked briskly out of the shop, and the door slammed shut behind him. Hermione felt her heart fluttering in her chest as she turned her attention to the newspaper and read the headline.

_ALBUS DUMBLEDORE PRESUMED DEAD - NO SUSPECTS IN CUSTODY._

_After weeks of searching for Albus Dumbledore, Ministry of Magic investigations have unearthed no sign of the man. Dozens of parties have been interviewed regarding the disappearance, and __Aurors_ _have searched countless locations. _

'_We have examined quite literally every parchment in Dumbledore's office,' says Hogwarts Headmaster Armando Dippet. 'We have allowed the Ministry into the school to search every nook and cranny.'_

_Hogsmeade_ _Village, Mould-on-the-Would, Ottery St Catchpole, Caerphilly, __Puddlemere__, and other wizarding villages have likewise been searched. Of course, Godric's Hollow has been turned upside-down looking for clues. But so far, the Ministry has been left without a single breadcrumb of evidence regarding Dumbledore's disappearance._

'_We have nothing to lead us to believe that he was murdered, nor that he committed suicide,' said Minister for Magic Spencer-Moon. 'It is, quite literally, like as though Albus Dumbledore vanished into thin air. It is bizarre, and very, very tragic.'_

_In Dumbledore's absence, his teaching position at Hogwarts is being filled by Kyrie Ellis. Headmaster Dippet says he retains hope that Dumbledore will turn up unharmed. Minister Spencer-Moon says the Ministry of Magic is exploring 'every possibility' regarding Dumbledore's disappearance, including the possibility that he has been __Obliviated_ _or has accidentally time travelled. But for now, Dumbledore is assumed dead, and the wizarding community is coming to grips with the hideous possibility of that reality._

Hermione froze. She dragged her fingertips over the newspaper article over and over again. The Ministry was examining the possibility that Dumbledore had time travelled? How would they even figure that out? How would they know? People In the world Hermione had left behind, had people written newspaper articles about her vanishing? Had they searched for her? Had they thought that maybe she'd time travelled? If so, how could they have figured that out?

Her eyes burned a little, and she flipped the newspaper over, deciding the shelves in the shop needed another Scouring.

* * *

Hermione walked into the White Wyvern and slid into a booth, and she sighed as she stared at the wood grain on the table.

"What'll it be, then?" asked Celia from beside the table.

"Just whatever stew's on tonight," Hermione said, "and a Butterbeer, please."

"Straight away," Celia nodded. She turned on her heel and stalked away, and Hermione felt her eyebrows go up as she saw the couple sitting just beyond where Celia walked. Walburga Black and Abraxas Malfoy were seated together at a table. Abraxas had a tumbler of firewhisky, and Walburga had a glass of red wine. They appeared to be animatedly chatting about something. Walburga laughed nervously, touching at her lips, and then Abraxas reached for her and squeezed a little.

"Oh! Tom!" Walburga and Abraxas released one another, and Abraxas flew to his feet. Tom Riddle drew up to the little table in a neatly tailored grey Muggle-style suit. He clapped Abraxas on the shoulder and appeared to murmur something to Walburga. He talked quietly with Abraxas for a moment, but his face was stony and grave. He nodded and walked toward Hermione, and Abraxas slowly sat back down, swigging his firewhisky.

"Hello," Hermione said as Tom slid into the booth opposite her. He nodded and folded his hands on the table, and he said crisply,

"I ate at a dinner meeting at the Ministry. I've just come to socialise. Perhaps you'll feed Porridge and come back to my flat with me."

"What did you say to Abraxas and Walburga?" Hermione asked, narrowing her eyes curiously. Tom stared at Hermione and blinked.

"I can read their thoughts as plainly as I can read anyone else's."

"And?" Hermione scowled. Tom pursed his lips and said,

"The two of them have grown quite close. One of the conversational subjects over which they've bonded is the fact that they both think there's something _off_ about you. Abraxas noticed your engagement ring on your finger before it vanished, when he first met you in Borgin and Burkes. Walburga thinks it's very strange that I've fallen for a Muggle-born. I won't use the term she throws about in her mind."

_Mudblood__,_ Hermione thought, an ugly coil of distaste twisting through her belly. Walburga thought of her as a Mudblood. She turned her eyes to the haughty witch who sat with Abraxas Malfoy. She frowned and thought of Sirius Black.

"If she doesn't marry Orion, Sirius will never be born," she whispered, but Tom pointed out,

"You've told me that Sirius Black wouldn't even be born for over a decade. Then he'd have to grow up, and you'd be much older than him. You wouldn't know him. Not really. Just the same, I dislike the idea of Abraxas Malfoy being affectionate with a witch whilst the two of them gossip about you."

"I don't think it's reasonable to expect Walburga Black to like me," Hermione said, but Tom said quite sharply,

"I will not stand for it, Hermione. I told Abraxas to stop thinking and talking about you. I think I got my message through."

Hermione opened her mouth to speak, but Celia walked up with her stew and Butterbeer. She reached into her drawstring bag to pull out a few coins, but Tom got there first. He handed Celia money for Hermione's meal and barked,

"That'll do, Celia. Nothing for me."

Celia marched off, and Hermione told him, "You don't have to buy my food."

"I am _with_ you," he said, and it came out in a bit of a snarl. Hermione sank her teeth into her lips as she met his eyes. His dark gaze was like black fire then as he whispered, "I am in love with you, and I will not allow people to talk rubbish about you behind our backs. I will not let people doubt you. I will not… I will buy your damned food if I want to."

Hermione nodded. "All right, then. Thank you, I suppose."

"Eat your stew," Tom snapped. "It's getting cold."

* * *

Hermione climbed out of Tom's bed, blinking in the darkness as she made her way to the bathroom. She wasn't sure what time it was, but moonlight was pouring in through Tom's window. She stepped into the bathroom and relieved herself in the toilet, washing her hands in the sink and noticing just how very naked she was.

She and Tom had come back to his flat after dinner at the White Wyvern, and they'd had two glasses of wine each. They'd danced slowly again to music on the Wizarding Wireless, and then they'd kissed and slowly pulled each other's clothes off and made their way to the bedroom. Tom had taken her from behind this time, with a little urging from Hermione, and he'd seemed to quite enjoy it. Hermione had certainly enjoyed it. He'd ground against her and massaged her breasts until they'd each found a release. And then he'd curled up with her and murmured to her that he wasn't going to let anybody speak ill of her. He'd caressed her hair and mumbled that he was in love with her, the her that she was.

And Hermione had fallen asleep knowing that she was precisely where she ought to be.

Now she walked out of the bathroom, nude, and saw Tom push himself up onto an elbow in the bed. She'd awakened him, apparently, with the flush of the toilet or the running sink. She flashed him a little smile and murmured,

"Hi."

"I had a dream," he said in a groggy voice. "I had a dream that you were able to Apparate here because you belonged here now."

Hermione's lips parted as she approached the bed. She stood beside Tom and laced her fingers through his.

"What an interesting dream," she mused. "It would be an intriguing thing, trying it again."

"You're rather naked to go Apparating about," he noted. Hermione smirked. She turned and walked away from Tom, back out to the sitting room. She started to dress, pulling on her knickers and her knee-length woolen dress. She slid on her low shoes and shucked on her winter cloak, and she heard Tom call from the bedroom,

"It is two o'clock in the morning, you realise."

"It was your dream, not mine," Hermione said. "I'd like to try. The worst thing that happens is that I wind up spraining my wrist falling hard on your floor in a failed attempt to -"

"The worst thing that happens," said Tom, coming into the sitting room and buttoning up his shirt, "is that you Vanish into Non-Being like your engagement ring did. The worst thing that happens is that you Splinch off your head. This is a stupid idea. We can travel by Floo Powder, or by broomstick, or by walking."

"I want to know," Hermione said firmly. "I want to know if you're right. If I actually belong here or not."

Tom sighed as he pulled on his own winter cloak over his white dress shirt. Hermione took his hand in hers and told him,

"I'm going to try to take you with me. Side-Along."

"Good. We can both collapse on the floor," Tom teased, but he seemed extremely uneasy. Hermione huffed a breath and whispered,

"Three, two, one." Then she shut her eyes, thought very hard of a specific spot in a wintry wood, and whirled hard to her right. She thought and thought of the place even as the inky black pulled and pinched at her and Tom. Suddenly they landed with a hard _thud_, and Hermione scrambled to her feet. She actually leaped up into the air then, letting out a whoop of delight as she realised she'd Apparated. Milky moonlight bathed the winding creek before them in a rippling silver glaze, and Hermione's feet crunched in snow as she dashed to Tom and threw her arms around him.

"Where are we?" he asked, and she told him,

"We're in the Forest of Dean."

"The Forest of Dean," he repeated. He pulled out his wand, as though he expected trouble to materialise for some reason. He narrowed his eyes and asked, "you mean the place where you came and camped and destroyed my locket Horcrux?"

Hermione's blood ran cold all of a sudden. She realised she hadn't really been thinking of Voldemort's Horcruxes when she'd decided to come here. She'd been thinking of her camping trip with her parents as a child. It was a safe place, the Forest of Dean. Even after all the madness that had transpired here during the Second Wizarding War, with Snatchers and lockets and the Sword of Gryffindor, Hermione had a fondness in her heart for this forest. She bit her lip and shrugged.

"It's what came into my head."

Tom spun his wand and scratched at his hair. "Well… I should certainly say you're able to Apparate just fine, Hermione. I think this tells us quite a lot. When you first arrived here, you were not of this time. Not yet. You hadn't settled into this thread sufficiently to move through time and space properly here. But now you belong to this timeline so thoroughly that you can Apparate. It is… meaningful, to say the least."

"Useful, too," Hermione grinned. She nodded, her smile fading just a little as she quoted Albus Dumbledore. "_You are precisely where you ought to be._"

Tom tucked his wand away and dragged his knuckles over Hermione's jaw. He nodded down at her and said softly,

"In this thread, there's no locket for you and your friends to destroy, because everything is different here. You know this. I love you. I am going to be the Minister for Magic; I'm going to be very powerful. But it's all different, and I won't hurt you here."

Hermione nodded, but her stomach ached as she wondered distantly just how deeply she could ever trust Tom Marvolo Riddle. She was in love with the wizard before her. She was. But she remembered the last time she'd been in this forest. She knew what he had become in that world she'd left behind.

All she could hope was that he was telling the truth now.

**Author's Note: So, Walburga and Abraxas were definitely up to something. But Hermione can Apparate! She's really a part of this thread! Thanks so much for reading and reviewing.**


	20. Chapter 20

The doorbell chimed, and the door opened, and a sheet of rain came cascading into Borgin and Burkes along with Hermione's mysterious neighbour.

She said nothing as Madam Mutatia's white-braided mother waddled into the shop. She just nodded a greeting. The old witch reached into her thick travelling cloak and pulled out a little box, setting it down on the counter before Hermione.

"I get deliveries sometimes," she croaked. Hermione's heart began to race, and she touched at the box as she whispered,

"Thank you."

The witch just bowed her head, and as she turned to go to the door, Hermione had the urge to call out to her. But as the witch neared the door, she began to dissolve, like salt in water. Hermione's eyes went round as the white-braided witch simply disappeared - not in a quick snap like Disapparation, but in a crumbling evaporation. Soon enough, she was entirely gone, leaving behind nothing but air where she'd been walking toward the door. Hermione's lips went cold, and she panted as she turned her attention to the box the witch had delivered.

She peeled open the lid and pulled out the single photograph inside. She put it on the glass counter and brought her fingertips to her lips, letting out a little noise of emotion. She was shocked to see that the photograph featured none other than Ronald Weasley blowing out candles on a birthday cake. Beside him, her hand pressed between Ron's shoulders, was Katie Bell. Around him was his family - his parents, Bill (who looked unscarred) with Fleur, Charlie and Percy and both twins alive and well. Ginny was there, holding Harry Potter's hand and looking on with a smiling face. Harry cheered as his best friend blew out the candles.

Hermione was taken aback by the photograph, and she instantly realised why. This, she knew, showed a world without war. This was a world where there had been no Order of the Phoenix, where Ron and Harry had simply met as school friends. This was a world where the Weasley family had stayed intact, where Ginny and Harry had fallen in love. Everyone was smiling. Everyone was happy. Ron looked as old as he'd been when she'd left him behind. He was grinning. He was happy. Harry was happy. Ginny was happy. Fred and George were alive and well, and Molly was not grieving her dead or maimed children. Arthur looked younger than he'd seemed in a great many years.

Hermione's hands shook like mad as she turned the photograph over. Sure enough, in the lower right-hand corner, there was a small inscription in Albus Dumbledore's neat hand.

_New threads woven. Joy abounds. With many thanks, Professor Dumbledore._

* * *

Hermione kicked the door of her flat shut and heaved a breath as she exclaimed,

"Porridge! It's raining… well, cats and dogs. It's raining cats and dogs out there."

Porridge came meandering out of the bedroom of the little flat, arching her back and letting out a quiet _meow._ Hermione nodded and said,

"Yes, you must be very hungry. I'm running late this evening. Mr Burke was showing me six new artefacts in the shop. He's getting older, Porridge. He says he's going to be entrusting more and more of the shop to me. I'm talking to a cat."

She laughed a little then, bending down and cuddling Porridge's pretty little face. She kissed the cat's head and murmured,

"Let me get your food."

She went over to Porridge's bowl and filled one with an _Aguamenti_ charm. She scooped out kibble into the other bowl, and Porridge happily began to eat. There was knocking on Hermione's flat door, and she smirked a little as she realised Tom must have come. She leaped up to her feet and rushed over to the door, eager to greet him.

But when she flung open the door, she was staring at Nott and Avery. Both were soaked to the bone from the cold rain outside, and Avery was clutching a scroll. Nott gave Hermione a little wave and said,

"Evening, Miss Granger. Sorry to bother you at home. Mr Riddle gave us your address."

"Oh. Erm…" Hermione glanced back into her _very_ modest flat, thinking of Nott's castle. She'd never been one to harp on financial status, but she suddenly found herself just the slightest bit embarrassed. Just the same, she stepped aside and asked, "Can I get you tea?"

"No, thank you. We've just come to deliver your invitation ourselves," said Avery. He passed over the scroll, looking quite proud of himself. Hermione frowned, confused, but took the scroll. She unfurled it and read,

_Messrs. Nott and Avery cordially invite you to a gala to benefit_

_The Society for the Promotion of Elfish Welfare_

_Saturday, 15 February at 7 in the evening_

_Nott Castle_

_Minimum donation: 20 Galleons_

_Featured Speakers: Mr Tom Riddle and Miss Hermione Granger_

Hermione blinked at the invitation a few times and then raised her face. She looked between Nott and Avery, her mouth falling open.

"Featured speaker," she said numbly.

"Well, Tom said that you wouldn't mind giving a bit of a speech about House-Elves, and the rights you believe they ought to have," Nott said. "He says he's going to speak on the importance of the cause to the wizarding world at large, and introduce you, and that you'll talk to us all about the cause. You'll do it, won't you?"

"I'll…" Hermione's eyes burned so badly that she simply could not stem the tears that formed. She wiped one away with a knuckle and whispered, "Of course I will speak at your fundraising gala to raise awareness for House-Elf rights."

"This was all Tom's idea, of course," Avery said lightly, "but we think it's all got quite a lot of merit. He hasn't been wrong yet. We're certain he's right on this, too."

"He's…" Hermione tried and failed to form words. She gulped and nodded. "Thank you. Thank you both."

Suddenly she wondered whether Walburga Black and Abraxas Malfoy would be there. She wondered whether the witch who thought Hermione was nothing but a _Mudblood_ with something _off_ about her belonged at a gala for House-Elves, taking money from and lecturing Purebloods. Of course not, Hermione realised. This was just going to stir up Walburga more than ever. And it would alienate Abraxas from Tom. So why was Tom doing this?

"Thank you both so very much," Hermione said again. "Are you certain I can't get you tea?"

"We're headed home. Thanks just the same." Avery smiled a little. "See you, Miss Granger."

"See you," Hermione said. Avery and Nott Disapparated from where they stood, vanishing into the air. Hermione rolled up her invitation and did the same, whirling hard to her right and Disapparating. She came to in the corridor outside Tom's flat, and she immediately began knocking upon his door. A few moments later, he opened his door, standing before her in a Muggle-style button-down shirt with the collar open and the sleeves rolled up. He was indefensibly handsome. He held a tumbler of firewhisky in one hand and smirked at Hermione's invitation.

"I see Nott and Avery paid you a visit." He sipped at his firewhisky, and Hermione let out a long breath. She stepped into his flat and demanded,

"Why have you set this up?"

"Well, I must say, that is not the reaction I was expecting," Tom said as he shut his door and turned the lock. "Wine? Whisky?"

"Butterbeer?" Hermione raised her eyebrows. Tom nodded. He went into his kitchen and opened a Chilled cupboard, extracting a bottle of Butterbeer. He used his wand to pull out the cork and carried the bottle over to Hermione. She nodded her thanks and sipped.

"Walburga and Abraxas will loathe both of us more than ever if you're involved in a fundraising gala intended to give rights to House-Elves," Hermione noted. "Why do you care about my pet cause?"

"Because," Tom said simply, "it is important to you. And because I want to begin enacting change within the wizarding community now. Real change. Meaningful change."

Hermione narrowed her eyes and shook her head. "The Lord Voldemort I knew would never define the success of his changes by how much leisure time elves get."

"I want people to see me as an influential wizard," Tom said simply. He sipped his firewhisky again. "If my girlfriend spearheads an activist movement to see that House-Elves are treated fairly, and I am seen actively promoting that movement through speeches and fundraising, I will be seen as a wizard with some measure of authority. A wizard whose will to accomplish societal shifts is real."

"So, playing along with S.P.E.W. is just a power move for you." Hermione swigged at her Butterbeer, but Tom looked almost wounded.

"No. I think you're actually right, that kicking them and whipping them is unnecessary cruelty. Avery and Nott are enthusiastic. Mulciber is fully onboard. Rookwood, Lestrange. They're in on S.P.E.W. All have promised donations exceeding one hundred Galleons. You can use that money to campaign for change within the Ministry and among families who utilise House-Elves. I'm trying to help S.P.E.W. not only to advance myself as a wizard, Hermione, but because it is _your_ movement."

She blinked. "And we are together, you and I."

He nodded. "Yes. We are together."

Tom stared down at Hermione for a long moment, and then he took her Butterbeer away from her and walked into the kitchen. He set her drink and his on the counter and turned, leaning against the wall for a moment with his arms crossed over his chest. He seemed profoundly thoughtful. Hermione frowned.

"Something's troubling you," she guessed. "Is it Walburga and Abraxas?"

"No," he scoffed, shaking his head. "They are the very, very least of my concerns. Abraxas Malfoy has money and prestige, but so do many others. Malfoy lacks in spine what he's got in name. I don't _need_ him. And Walburga is one of a great many Black family members; we'll do just fine without her."

"But they suspect something of me," Hermione pointed out. "What if they guess that I'm a time traveller?"

Tom curled up half his mouth, almost sadly. He stared at Hermione and shrugged. "Then I suppose they will have guessed right."

"In the world I left behind," Hermione told him, walking closer, "you wanted nothing but power and immortality."

"Was in love there?" Tom raised a brow, and Hermione choked out a laugh.

"I… I don't think so. I didn't know you personally. Not very well, anyway. But I do not suppose you were in love, no."

"Well." Tom pinched his lips and said, "it changes things, at least a little. Do not misunderstand me. I still crave power, to the marrow of my bones. I still fear death, quite terribly. You are not with a good man, Hermione Granger. But this thread is an entirely different existence than the world you left behind, and here -"

"Here you are an Obliviator working toward a position on the Wizengamot, and someday you'll be Minister for Magic," Hermione said softly. "Here you've organised a gala to benefit S.P.E.W. because it is _my_ movement."

"Because we are together, you and I," he whispered, and when she nodded, he added, "because you were sent here specifically to be with me."

He reached into the pocket of his Muggle-style suit trousers then. He cleared his throat and pushed off the wall, and he mumbled,

"I'm about to do this in my kitchen, of all places."

"Do what?" Hermione felt cold all of a sudden, as if she understood distantly what was happening but simply could not bring herself to consciously comprehend. Tom stepped closer to Hermione, looming over her as he used his left hand to hold her cheek. His right hand stayed in his pocket as he reminded her,

"Albus Dumbledore told you that you were sent to this time so that you and I could be together, because in our being together, the threads of the future would be shifted for the better. Have I got that right?"

"I think so." Hermione's voice cracked a little. She gazed up at Tom, but his throat bobbed visibly, and his cheeks coloured darkly. He shifted on his feet and seemed quite anxious as he asked,

"Do you love me, Hermione? I do realise it hasn't been so very long, but I… tell me if I am being foolish."

"You're not being foolish," Hermione assured him. Her stomach flopped as he chomped his lip, his face going darker than ever. He cleared his throat quite roughly and said,

"It's nothing remarkable. I am not wealthy. Yet."

"What do you mean?" she asked, though she was now beginning to know precisely what he meant. She blinked very quickly as Tom shut his eyes and whispered,

"We are together, you and I."

Then he descended, going down onto one knee and letting his hand fall from Hermione's face. Her breath shook so badly then that she thought she might faint, but she managed to keep standing as Tom took Hermione's left hand and stared at it. He brushed his thumb over her fingers and mumbled,

"I am not meaning to take anyone's place. This is a new life."

"I… I understand." Hermione shut her eyes for a moment and imagined Ron with Katie Bell, grinning as he blew out birthday candles in the photograph the old witch had brought her. She imagined him happy with someone else in another thread. She imagined him waking up in bed with another witch, kissing someone else goodnight. She imagined him dancing with some other woman and telling her she was pretty. And then she opened her eyes and saw Tom Riddle staring up at her with a ring in his hand.

"Hermione," he said quietly, "I will never know, probably, the _exact_ way or even the true reason you were sent to me. All I know is that it was decided that your being with me was the best thing for everybody… for all of us. For me, most especially. I consider myself exceptionally fortunate to have encountered you that morning in Madam Amaranth's Herb Shop. It is, without a doubt, the moment that shifted my life forever. Please, I beg it of you, change the rest of my life. Marry me."

Hermione tried to answer him. She tried to say _yes_. She tried to form a word. Nothing came out. Finally she just nodded and whispered,

"All right."

He slid her ring onto her finger, and she got a good look at it. It was a platinum setting with scrolling carved into the band. A cluster of three small diamonds framed the pear-shaped centre stone. It was intricate and feminine, yet very interesting to look at. Hermione marveled at the ring and wondered where Tom had gotten the money to buy it. He slowly stood and said to her,

"I'll get you something better when I can afford it."

"Something better?" Hermione scoffed. "Are you mad?"

"Probably just a little bit," Tom said quietly. Hermione raised her eyes to him and shook her head in disbelief.

"We're going to get married."

He smirked and nodded. "Yes. We are. Now… let's go celebrate, shall we?"

He took Hermione's hand and started to pull her toward his bedroom, and Hermione felt a great smile spread across her face.

**Author's Note: ****Awwwwwwww****. They're ****engaaaaaaaged****. And he organized a fundraiser for S.P.E.W. And Hermione now knows that what she does here is leading to Harry and Ron being happy and healthy. Now… all aboard the lemon express! Thank you so much for reading and reviewing. **


	21. Chapter 21

Hermione gasped as Tom slammed the bedroom door shut and shoved Hermione against it.

"Tom," she growled, a bit taken aback by his sudden, unexpected aggressiveness. Hadn't he just proposed marriage to her in an awfully romantic way? But now he seized Hermione's face in his hands and bent down, crushing her in a fierce kiss. She squealed a bit up into his mouth, feeling frantic as she grappled at his button-down shirt. Her fingers started to work at his buttons as his tongue shoved between her lips. He dragged his tongue along the roof of her mouth and then yanked his lips from hers, using his head to shove her jaw to the side. Hermione mewled as he moved his mouth to her neck, his teeth pulling at the skin beneath her ear.

Her fingers trembled on his buttons as she tried to unfasten them, as she pushed his shirt off of his shoulders and arms. She started to flush wet between her legs, and her skin went warm and prickled. Tom lapped at her neck and hummed into her ear,

"You are going to marry me."

"I'll need a wedding dress." Hermione shut her eyes and felt quite dizzy. Suddenly she realised that her father wasn't here to walk her down the aisle, that her mother wasn't here to help her get ready on the morning of her wedding. Ron and Harry weren't here to celebrate with her.

"Hermione." Tom kept his mouth on her neck as he shucked his shirt. He snaked his fingers into her hair and pet at her waist with his other hand. He touched his lips to the skin just in front of her ear, and he said softly, "It can be small and simple. No aisle. No party. If that's what you want."

She huffed a breath from deep in her lungs. She ran her fingers up and down Tom's arms and rubbed at his shoulders, and she said,

"You want to show off for your friends."

"I have no desire to force you to to vow yourself to me in front of Purebloods who judge your background, Hermione." Tom pulled back a little bit. "I have no desire to make you put on a show where the people you're missing aren't there. Let's do it quietly. Just a small group of the old friends who treat us well. Nott, Avery, Mulciber, Yaxley, the Lestranges. Druella and Cygnus. We'll have a little dinner party afterwards to celebrate."

"And who will host?" Hermione asked. Tom quirked up his lips.

"Whoever I ask to host will do it," he said quite confidently. "Avery's home is lovely. He'll do it in a heartbeat. Listen… Hermione, I haven't got any family. You know damned well why that is."

She gulped. She knew what he'd done to his father and grandparents. She knew that his uncle had been blamed. She knew that his mother had died. She nodded. Tom shrugged.

"And your parents died in the Blitz, didn't they? Hmm? So all we've got are my old friends, your new friends. We'll have a handfasting, and we'll have a dinner party. And then we'll be husband and wife, won't we?"

"But first," Hermione said softly, "we shall have a fundraising gala for S.P.E.W., and we need to write speeches."

Tom began to play with Hermione's curls in one hand as his other fingers slid up the bottom hem of her woolen skirt. He smirked at her as he hummed,

"_In the wake of a terrible conflict in the Muggle world and an earth-shattering war here in our wizarding world, one might ask why the issue of House-Elves' rights is so very pressing. But the matter is urgent precisely because we are at a nexus, a point at which we must make decisions about the pathways we shall follow as a Magical community. Will we choose unnecessary cruelty toward Beasts and Beings, or will we decide to rise above our baser instincts and treat our fellow creatures with dignity? I implore you, my friends, to choose wisely. Our future begins now, here, together."_

"Tom." Hermione reached for the placket of his trousers and began frantically unfastening them. She went up onto her tiptoes and whispered, "Kiss me."

"Do you like it when I talk like that?" Tom teased her. "Do you like it when I reveal to you just how I'm going to help convince everyone to support your cause?"

"Tom." Hermione shoved down his trousers, and he wriggled out of them. He kicked them away with his underwear, and Hermione wrapped her hand around the shaft of his cock. She suddenly remembered something awful, and she gave Tom a very apologetic look as she said in a cracked voice, "I started bleeding this morning."

"Oh." His cheeks went a bit red, but he nodded and said, "That's all right. We'll just… we'll sit and talk in the -"

"I'll use my mouth," Hermione offered. "Like you did to me."

Tom's dark eyes flashed. His throat bobbed, and he watched closely as Hermione sank down onto her knees. She stared up at him once she'd descended. She breathed in the heady, musky scent of his manhood, and she just examined him for a long moment. His cock was longer and thicker than any she'd seen in real life. He had a thatch of short black hair against his pelvis, and his orbs hung between his thighs in an almost aggressive declaration of masculinity. Hermione dragged her fingers up and down Tom's length for a moment and eyed the purplish tip of his cock, which was smooth and just a bit shiny compared to the rest. She leaned forward and pressed her lips to the tip, tasting salt on him - pre-come. She shivered, letting out a little sound against him.

Suddenly she felt his fingers snare into her hair, and she could hear his breath quickening above her. She wrapped her left hand around his shaft and stared at her fourth finger, where he'd put her engagement ring. She examined the arrangement of stones, the filigree on the band. It was a beautiful ring, she thought. She tried to remember the night Ron had proposed to her. She tried to remember using her mouth on Ron. But it felt so far away now, like a different…

Like a different world entirely.

Hermione gazed at the engagement ring Tom Riddle had put on her finger, and she thought of the photograph she'd been given, the one where Ron had been with Katie Bell and had been grinning, blowing out birthday candles. She thought of how happy Ron had been, somewhere real, somewhere without her. Dumbledore had written to her that her existence in this new life had created new threads. How many threads were there? Did it matter? Somewhere, somewhere _real,_ somewhere without her, Ron Weasley was happy.

"I've lost you," Tom murmured from above Hermione, but she raised her eyes to him and assured him,

"I'm right here. We're together, you and I."

Then she wrapped her lips around the head of his cock and slid it into her mouth. She suckled at him until his tip hit the back of her throat, and she struggled not to gag. With one hand, she pumped a bit on his shaft, and her other hand very gently weighed his twin orbs. She massaged him and sucked hard, letting her throat contract around his tip. Tom grunted and squeezed his fingers in Hermione's hair, whispering desperately,

"Oh, that feels _much_ too good."

She smiled against him. This was all still so new to him. He'd been a virgin, that night in her flat in Knockturn Alley, when she'd ridden him on the divan and he'd touched her like he knew just what he was doing. He was more practised now; they'd done plenty together. But she could tell that no one had ever done this to him, what she was doing now. And he liked it.

Hermione pulled him out of her mouth with a little _pop_ and lapped her tongue around his tip. She licked at him like she was enjoying an ice cream cone, and she drove her fist up and down his lubricated cock. Her other hand slid up toward his stomach, toying with the bit of hair there, and he started to really play with her waves. She relished the feel of his fingertips on her scalp, and she wanted him so badly she could hardly stand it. She tipped her head back and stared up at him, and then she realised he was awfully, awfully close to finishing. His mouth had fallen open, and his eyes were wrenched shut. His chest was heaving with quick, shallow breath. His back arched a little, and he let out a growl between clenched teeth.

Hermione had never actually tasted a wizard's seed. With Ron, the few times she'd used her mouth, she'd made him come on a towel she'd been holding at the time. But Hermione didn't have a towel right now. What she did have was a morbid curiosity. She'd heard it tasted awful, but for some reason, she wanted to find out for herself.

She delved deeply onto his cock, letting the tip hit the back of her throat, and she gripped him so tightly she worried she would hurt him. She felt him pumping in her hand, felt him twitching and throbbing. He groaned her name a few times, and then she tasted it - metallic and bitter and salty. It wasn't pleasant, but it also wasn't the worst thing Hermione had tasted. She'd had Polyjuice Potion, after all. She gulped and gulped until the taste of it was gone, and then she let Tom slide out of her mouth. She stared up at him and dragged her wrist over her lips, and he marveled down at her,

"I won't ask you to do that with any frequency, but rest assured that it will be greatly appreciated every time you decide to do it."

She choked out a little laugh then and heaved herself up to stand. She opened the door behind her, gagging a little on the remnants of the taste in her mouth. Tom seemed confused until she went out to the kitchen and grabbed her bottle of Butterbeer off the counter. She swigged down a few mouthfuls, which successfully cleansed her palate. She picked up Tom's firewhisky and carried it back to the bedroom. He was still naked, going flaccid, as she handed him his drink. He knocked back the liquor and touched at his forehead.

"Well." He set down the empty tumbler on the bedside table. "There's a thing."

Hermione giggled quietly. "Sorry about the bad timing. You seemed to enjoy yourself just fine, though."

"I should say so." He raised his eyebrows and slid his hands around Hermione's waist. "Don't worry; I'll take good care of you very soon."

She shivered at that, remembering the way he'd made her toes curl the last time he'd been inside of her. She enjoyed being with Tom Riddle, she realised. He was her wizard, and she was his witch. They belonged to one another. They were each other's.

He'd said that before, she thought, about her and Ron. But things were different now. Things had changed, warped and shifted. New threads had been created. Ron was happy somewhere else, with Katie Bell or Lavender Brown. He was all right without Hermione, and she was just fine with Tom Riddle.

And people were alive who had been tragically killed, she told herself firmly. Grieving mother's hearts weren't broken. Orphaned children had their parents. The wizarding world hadn't been torn to shreds by the maniacal rage of a Lord Voldemort who had rampaged without love. Instead, Tom Riddle was working as an Obliviator with goals of being the Minister for Magic. He was recruiting his friends to support S.P.E.W., in part because he wanted to prove just how influential he could be.

And he was in love.

It made all the difference in the world, Hermione thought, that she was here, that they were together. She still had no idea how she'd been sent back in time, but she knew enough to understand that it had been good and right that she come.

"It'll just be a small party," Tom told her, still naked as he held onto her waist and stared down at her. "It'll just be a handfasting in Avery's beautiful conservatory, with our closest friends there, and then we'll have a dinner party afterwards."

Hermione's eyes burned just a little as she nodded. "I'll still need a dress."

Tom curled up half his mouth and nodded. "You will look very, very pretty, Hermione. Of course, I think you're pretty all the time. I think you're pretty when you're eating soup in the White Wyvern, and when you're Scouring shelves in Borgin and Burkes. I think you're pretty when you're talking about House-Elves. I think you're pretty when you're -"

"Tom," Hermione interrupted, and he just stared for a moment before she whispered, "I love you."

He held her face in his hands and bent to brush his lips against hers. His breath was warm as he promised her,

"This is forever. I asked you to be my wife because you're staying here forever. You understand?"

"Yes," she nodded, kissing him back a little harder. "I understand."

**Author's Note: Just so everyone is aware, this story is nearing its end! We've only got a few chapters left, and then I'll be moving on to a new Tomione project. Depending on how people feel, I may return to this storyverse after my next project and write a sequel to **_**Inimica, Amator**_**. We'll see! In any case, we'll begin tying up loose threads and answering questions in the next few chapters here. Thank you so very much for reading and reviewing!**


	22. Chapter 22

"Coming!" Hermione spit out her toothpaste and rushed out of her little bathroom at the sound of the insistent knocking. She was already in pyjamas, and at this time of night, she had a fairly good idea of who her visitor was. So she was unsurprised when she opened the door that led from her flat to the corridor outside and saw Tom Riddle standing there in his Obliviator's Muggle-style suit. What she wasn't prepared for was the exceedingly serious expression he bore on his face. He said quietly,

"May I come in?"

Hermione turned down her lips and stepped aside. Tom walked in and shut the door behind him, and Porridge walked up, curling against Tom's leg. Tom ignored the cat and cleared his throat.

"Tea?" Hermione asked, feeling anxious. Tom shook his head. Suddenly Hermione wished she had his gift of Legilimency, and she crossed her arms over her chest as she snapped,

"Out with it, then. What's wrong? Are you calling off the wedding?"

"No. Of course not," he said, "Though I fear this news may be just as poorly received."

Hermione furrowed her brows at him. "Tell me."

Tom licked his lips. "Walburga Black has gotten into the minds of her old Pureblood friends and poisoned them against the idea of House-Elf rights. She's convinced almost everybody that S.P.E.W. is… well… they're telling Avery that it's _the foolish endeavour of a Muggle-born._"

"A Mudblood," Hermione spat. "Walburga's convinced them that pursuing the rights of House-Elves is just a silly game played by a Mudblood. Is that it?"

"Yes." Tom pinched his lips. "I could Confound them all into donating, into treating their Elves the way you'd like, but it wouldn't be genuine. And it wouldn't help either of us. If we mean to enact real change, we'll have to have real allies. Walburga needs to be destroyed."

Hermione's eyes went round. "Tom Riddle," she hissed. "You can't go murdering Walburga Black because she got my S.P.E.W. gala cancelled!"

"I didn't say _murdered._" Tom rolled his eyes. "I said _destroyed._ Something could happen to ruin her reputation among the Pureblood crowd and make room for you and I to forge the connections I need."

"The connections you desire," Hermione corrected. Tom narrowed his eyes and scoffed.

"Do you wish to advance the cause of House-Elves' rights, or don't you?"

"Not at the expense of other people, Tom," Hermione shot back. He nodded.

"Let's not argue."

He'd said that before. He always shut down arguments before they could blossom out of control, Hermione thought. She sighed and shrugged.

"So. No gala. Avery's cancelled it."

"It was just going to be you, me, Nott, and Avery," Tom said rather gently. "Even the Lestranges said they couldn't give time or appearance to a cause that seemed so contrary to the ancient Pureblood ways."

"I see." Hermione chewed her lip. "That's too bad. I was looking forward to your speech. To using the funds raised to fight for the elves' rights."

"It will happen," Tom assured her, "just as surely as I'll be Minister of Magic someday. In fact, I will make you this promise, Hermione. When I am the Minister for Magic, I'll sign laws giving freedoms to the House-Elves the likes of which they've never known. I shall use my power to push forth the change these people won't accept for themselves."

Hermione gave him a crooked little smile and shook her head. "You'll be despot for good, is that it?"

"I will be a force for change," Tom said roughly. Hermione stared up at him and nodded. She asked cautiously,

"And the wedding?"

"I…" Tom stared into the kitchen for a long moment and murmured, "I am disinclined to show that degree of emotional vulnerability around people who don't even grant me enough respect to support S.P.E.W. I think it would be best if we did a Ministry ceremony in the Office of Marriage, Birth, and Death Registration."

Hermione nodded. The Purebloods he sought to control had not earned the privilege of witnessing Tom in his most private moments. Tom would need to climb at the Ministry and continue warping and shaping the social structures if he wanted to regain his footing. He'd misstepped, perhaps, in being so enthusiastic about S.P.E.W., at least as far as wooing the Purebloods was concerned. But he'd shown great loyalty to Hermione in doing so, and she thought he'd arranged the thread in which they were living in a very necessary way. He needed to climb more righteously than he'd done before. Perhaps that required some pushback, some adversity. Perhaps it required some humility. It certainly required love.

"I am disappointed," Hermione admitted, "that there will not be a gala for S.P.E.W. It was very kind of you to try to arrange it. It was wonderful of you to actually hear me, to listen to what concerned me and to fight for it. But I have confidence that you and I will both get what we want in the end, Tom."

"I've already got most of what I want," he said, turning his eyes back to her. He reached for her left hand, to where her engagement ring was, and he dragged his fingers over the diamonds. He murmured, "I Conjured us some simple platinum wedding bands. That much metalwork I can handle."

Hermione sniffed a little and glanced down to where Porridge was twining around Tom's legs. She remembered the day Tom had shown up, soaked from the rain, holding the cat he'd bought her. She smiled a little and glanced around her little flat.

"I don't want to live here anymore," she said. "I want to live at your flat instead."

"All right." Tom smiled at her and nodded. "Come live with me in my flat. After we're married."

Hermione smirked. "Well, then, I think we ought to get married very soon."

"How quickly can you get a dress?" Tom asked, and Hermione hesitated as she glanced over her shoulder to her bedroom.

"I've already got a dress," she admitted, thinking of how she'd gone earlier today and gotten an antique wedding gown at the secondhand robe shop. She'd made alterations to it until it was precisely the wedding dress Hermione wanted, and now it was perfect. She gulped and turned back to Tom, and she shrugged. "I'm perfectly capable of Conjuring myself a bouquet of flowers."

Tom blinked at her. "Leave work early tomorrow. Tell Mr Burke you're going to the Ministry of Magic to get married."

Hermione grinned broadly. She nodded, letting out a shaking breath, and she whispered, "All right, then."

Tom huffed. "You know, tea sounds just fine."

* * *

"Thank you again, Mr Burke." Hermione waved a little as she walked out the front door of Borgin and Burkes. Her stomach fluttered with anticipation as she turned and began walking toward her building. Mr Burke had let her go at two in the afternoon so she could dress and get to the Ministry with plenty of time to meet Tom and get married. Hermione trembled as she realised she was going to be married _today_.

"Miss Granger?"

She whirled around at the sound of her name, and she saw Madam Mutatia, the kinky-haired, wild-eyed Medium from down the road standing in the middle of Knockturn Alley. Madam Mutatia held out her hand.

"May we speak?"

"I'm actually… it's not a good time," Hermione said. "So sorry."

"I know where you're off to," Madam Mutatia nodded. "Congratulations. This is very important. Please. It'll only take a moment."

Hermione frowned and walked toward Madam Mutatia. She hesitantly followed the Medium into her shop. It was full of candles and draping materials. Human skulls, some painted with intricate designs, sat alongside crystals and hourglasses. Madam Mutatia gestured to the round table in the centre of the room, with a circle of candles sat around the perimeter. Cushions were on the floor around the table, and Madam Mutatia knelt slowly upon one.

"My mother is gone," she said. Hermione stayed standing and stammered,

"She… I…"

"There was a prophecy that has now been fulfilled," Madam Mutatia said calmly, "and so I know that my mother has gone for good. My mother delivered many prophecies, some recorded by the Ministry of Magic, some not. I was the recipient of many of her visions. She was a very gifted Seer, but the talent began to sap her in so many ways. In her later years, she began to receive indications of a grave and terrible future that needed to be stopped. She began to communicate, through me as a Medium, with a man in a future existence. A man called Albus Dumbledore."

"But Albus Dumbledore was alive here," Hermione said confusedly. "He defeated Gellert Grindelwald here."

"This Albus Dumbledore was an old man who had defeated another awful wizard. Lord Voldemort," said Madam Mutatia. Hermione felt cold as Madam Mutatia said, "A series of communications through the past and present began to make it clear that the only way to heal the egregious wounds inflicted upon countless threads of the future was by healing this thread, this present existence in which Tom Riddle is not yet lost. And that's where you came in, Miss Granger."

Hermione took a step back, bumping into a table full of bones and crystals. She straightened it and said,

"Your mother kept giving me photographs. Pictures showing me the people I left behind. They were alive. Happy. With other people."

"There are many timelines that exist concurrently," Madam Mutatia explained, "and all can be catastrophically or beautifully affected by the deeds undertaken in one existence. By you having come here, by you having fallen in love with Tom Riddle, you have spared many people suffering and death. You will be his wife, and you will be by his side as his lust for power manifests in a triumphant tenure as the Minister for Magic, instead of as a horrifying Dark wizard. You are the alteration. You are the shift."

Hermione let out a breath that quaked like the last leaf on an autumn twig. She felt her eyes sear, and she whispered,

"I just want to be happy here."

"You will be. Would you like to see?" Madam Mutatia reached onto the cushion beside her for a leather folio. She held it up to Hermione, who walked over and took the folio. She opened the folder and saw that there was a newspaper inside, a copy of the _Daily Prophet. _Hermione instinctively checked the date before she did anything else. 2nd May 1953. Hermione's eyes flicked down to the headline, and she froze.

_MINISTER FOR MAGIC TOM RIDDLE WELCOMES FIRST CHILD._

_Tom Riddle, who has been lauded as one of the most effective and revolutionary Ministers for Magic despite his astonishing youth, has welcomed his first child with his wife, Hermione Granger. Madam Granger, Head of the Department for the Control and Regulation of Magical Creatures, is known for being the mind behind __all of the_ _recent legislation aimed at improving the welfare of House-Elves and strengthening relations between wizards and Beings._

_The baby, a boy called Shepherd Riddle, was delivered safely of Madam Granger at St Mungo's Hospital on the 30th of April. Both mother and child are said to be doing quite well. Minister Riddle delivered the following statement to the Daily Prophet._

'_My wife Hermione and I are exceedingly grateful for the outpouring of support we have received since the birth of our wonderful son, Shepherd Riddle. We are overjoyed to be parents. Rest assured that I shall be resuming my duties as Minister shortly, but as I take a brief paternity leave, wizarding Britain is in capable hands.'_

_The staff of the Daily Prophet wish Minister Riddle and Madam Granger every health and happiness and congratulate them most heartily on the birth of their son._

Hermione's heart raced as she put the newspaper back into the folio. She passed it back down to Madam Mutatia and demanded,

"Where did you get this?"

Madam Mutatia gave Hermione a knowing little smile, and suddenly her mother's features were manifest. Madam Mutatia set down the folio and said simply,

"I get deliveries sometimes. You should go, Miss Granger. Wouldn't want to be late to your own wedding, now, would you? Congratulations."

* * *

"You look…" Tom just gaped from where he stood in a crisp black suit. He blinked at Hermione, and she giggled softly at him.

"Yes?" she prompted. He let out a little breath and whispered,

"You look perfect."

Hermione smiled so broadly then that her cheeks hurt. She'd bought a gown that had had full, floor-length skirts, but she'd shortened them until they hit mid-calf. They were of light, airy white tulle. The bodice with long sleeves and a high neck were a rich white lace, and there was a thick sash of silk across the waist. Hermione had to admit to herself that the dress felt _awfully_ pretty. She'd used some of the leftover tulle from her alterations to make a veil for herself, and once she'd arranged her hair into a neat, tight chignon, she'd pinned in the veil so that it hung down her back. She'd Conjured herself a bouquet of white roses bound up with white silk ribbon, and she had Transfigured her high-heeled shoes to be a clean, shiny white. She'd put on beautification creme, then Charmed her lips and cheeks until they were rouged. She certainly looked and felt bridal.

"I have the rings," Tom said, shifting on his feet where he stood outside the Office of Marriage, Birth, and Death Registrations in the Ministry of Magic. Hermione watched as an old witch went walking by looking very sorrowful indeed, and then as a couple toting two toddlers and a newborn walked into the office. Hermione turned her attention to Tom as he extracted two platinum rings from his trouser pocket and held them out. Hermione took the larger, thicker one meant for him and held onto it, smiling a little.

"You've done well making these," she said.

"Hermione," he said seriously, and she stared up at him as his face went stony. He waited as a sobbing witch came walking out of the Registration office with an older wizard's arm around her shoulders, and he muttered, "Do they really have to handle all of this in one damned office?"

Finally, the hullabaloo died down, and he cleared his throat. Then he said softly,

"I am going to be the Minister for Magic. I am going to be a very powerful wizard. And you are going to be a very influential witch. And we are going to make a very happy life together, you and I. You are here forever. You've been sent here to be with me, to make me better, and I am very glad you've come. And things will be different from how you remember."

"I know." Hermione nodded firmly. "I do. I know it. I know it's all true."

He looked just a little taken aback, as though he'd expected to need to do more convincing. But Hermione whispered,

"The futures that have been created because of the present we're making now… this is all for the best. This is what's meant to be. You and I… here… us. I am precisely where I ought to be."

He seized her hand then and pulled her toward him, dragging her up into a kiss. Hermione moaned softly onto him, trying not to mash her flowers against the front of his suit. She pulled away and laughed a little,

"Let's go get married."

They went into the office and wrote their name on a parchment, and after about five minutes, a stern witch behind a desk called,

"Riddle and Granger!"

Hermione stood, and Tom took her hand as he led her up to the counter. The angry-looking witch at the desk said sharply,

"Marriage today?"

"Yes, if it's not too much trouble," Tom smirked. Hermione tried not to laugh. She squeezed Tom's hand, and the witch pulled out a parchment and dipped her quill into the inkpot beside her.

"Name of groom?"

"Tom Marvolo… _M-A-R-V-O-L-O…_ yes. Riddle." Tom cleared his throat, coughing into his hand, and then appeared to be toying with Hermione's platinum wedding ring. She smiled reassuringly at him, and the witch snapped,

"Name of bride?"

"Hermione Jean Granger," Hermione said. "I'll be keeping my surname."

She glanced toward Tom, because they had not actually discussed that matter. She expected him to frown, or to ask if they could speak privately for a moment. But she realised that in the newspaper Madam Mutatia had shown her, she'd been referred to as _Madam Granger._ That had been from this thread, she thought. That was the future she was going to live here. She couldn't breathe, all of a sudden. She gulped as Tom flashed her a little look and whispered,

"Madam Hermione Granger."

They gave their dates of birth - Hermione gave a false one - and places of birth. They had to give their parents' names, and then they had to sign the license. Then the witch asked Tom,

"Do you, Tom Marvolo Riddle, take this witch, Hermione Jean Granger, to be your spouse in mind, body, and soul from this day forward? Do you promise to honour and cherish her as her husband, to meld your magic with hers in an unending bond of marriage?"

"I do," Tom said, and Hermione could not keep from grinning as he slid her platinum ring onto her finger. The witch asked,

"Do you, Hermione Jean Granger, take this wizard, Tom Marvolo Riddle, to be your spouse in mind, body, and soul from this day forward? Do you promise to honour and cherish him as his wife, to meld your magic with his in an unending bond of marriage?"

"I do." Hermione promised, and her hands shook like mad as she slid his ring onto his finger. She reached up to hold his face in her hands, and he bent to kiss her. She only distantly heard the Ministry witch declare,

"Congratulations; you are now husband and wife."

It wasn't until Tom had walked her out of the Office, out into the black-tiled foyer near the bank of lifts, that the weight of what had transpired finally hit Hermione.

"I'm home," she whispered, and when Tom stared down at her, she nodded and glanced at her rings before repeating, "I'm home. I'm precisely where I ought to be."

"I am going to be powerful," he told her, "but it will be different from what you lived."

"I know," she nodded frantically. "It's all right. It's all… it's going to be wonderful. It's going to be marvelous."

_Shepherd,_ she thought desperately, envisioning a newborn boy. Her eyes seared like wildfire, and she blinked through tears up at Tom as she reached for his hand and told him,

"We're together, you and I."

He brought her knuckles to her lips and kissed them, and he smiled.

**THE END**

**Author's Note: ****Aaaaaaaagh****! So, I had to end this story here because, as difficult as it is to wrap stories up, they all have their natural conclusions, and this one was at its end. HOWEVER, I very well may return to this ****storyverse** **for a sequel, because there's so much more I want to explore - the enmity with Walburga, winning over the Purebloods, Tom's ascent to Minister, the birth of Shepherd. After my next Tomione project, I'd love to write a sequel for this story. If I do, I hope you'll join me.**

**VERY SOON (i.e. within the next few days), I'll begin work on my next novel-length Tomione story, which will be entitled **_**Revision and Rescript**_**. **

**THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING **_**INIMICA, AMATOR. **_**I HOPE YOU'VE ENJOYED IT!**


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